


Curiosity

by uhright



Series: Questions and Answers [1]
Category: The Last of Us
Genre: Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, Curiosity, Cussing, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Eventual Smut, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Murder, Pining, Sequel is up, Sexual Content, Slow Burn, Smut, Suicidal Thoughts, Torture, a lot of sex stuff ok, sexual fantasies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-29
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-07-19 02:46:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 12
Words: 31,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7341490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uhright/pseuds/uhright
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's in his quietness that you find interest—a man of few words and even fewer smiles, dedicated to survival and nothing else; a person broken and hardy, who's faced trials and tribulations that you can't even fathom. He's much older than you, yet his experience attracts you to men like him, not the younger boys who barely even know how to handle a gun...  </p><p>You can tell that he <em>definitely</em> knows how to handle a gun.</p><p>*SEQUEL IS UP*</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Interest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really sorry but I couldn't find any stories that scratched my extremely specific itch, so I wrote my own. Hopefully it scratches someone else's. I don't know why there aren't more stories with Joel that aren't Joel/Ellie cause he's a silver fox if I've ever seen one.
> 
> This story is set approx. a few years - somewhere between 5 and 10 idk - after the outbreak, when Joel and Tommy are still straight up murdering people to get by (meaning Tommy hasn't left for the Fireflies yet). 
> 
> Also, I have a really big thing for older man/younger woman relationships. Crucify me.
> 
> This is gonna be full of UST and sex stuff because Reader is curious and Joel is the only man around, so of course she'll place all of her pining and fantasies and curiosities and such on him.

It's in his quietness that you find interest—a man of few words and even fewer smiles, dedicated to survival and nothing else; a person broken and hardy who's faced trials and tribulations that you can't even fathom. And you've figured that out within the five minutes he's taken to watch you while his brother's away.  

He's much older than you, yet his experience attracts you to men like him, not the younger boys who barely know how to handle a gun...  

You can tell that he _definitely_ knows how to handle a gun.  

You offer him your name, and he responds in a smooth accent and a gruff voice that makes your heart skip a beat.  

"Joel." 

"Nice to meet someone friendly," you say, having to clear your throat when your mouth runs dry and your voice breaks.  

He grunts in agreement and starts to sift through the boxes sitting haphazardly upon the shelf, finding cans of food and ammunition, amongst other things.  

His brother walks in, snaps you from your reverie with the sound of his voice.  

"We got 'em. I'll take (Name) downstairs while you finish up here."  

* * *

You don't see him again for another month.  

When you do, however, it's just like the first time. Your crush gets the best of you, and you aren't able to register what he's saying under the butterflies clogging up your whole body. You have it bad.  

He repeats to you that your brother is dead, and it isn't the greeting you wanted to hear. You ask him what you'll do since you don't have your brother to keep you safe within the community, and he offers you to come with him and some close friends. You think it weird, since he's more of a "leave you behind" kind of guy than the "drag you around" kind. Shoot first, ask questions later. 

* * *

The moment you see him shoot an unarmed man without hesitation and steal everything that was on his person is when you start to be afraid of him.  

"We're runnin' out of supplies," he mutters after seeing the shocked look on your face, hoping that it'll pass as an explanation, yet you know he did it because it's the only thing he knows to do now—kill or be killed.  

You say nothing, just wait until he's done scavenging before setting off yet again.  

After days of being separated from what was left of your group, both of you find it a very slim-to-none chance at ever reuniting with them again, so you make it a plan to live until the next big city.  

At the next gas station you pass you find a compilation of comics ending with bad puns. Your jokes have him chuckling, and you smile.  

* * *

The longer the two of you stay together, the more you pick up on his personality, the little subconscious habits he does that make you both grin and want to pull your hair out. He teaches you about the rules of the land and the different kind of variants—there's no way bloaters are real—and you repeatedly thank him for taking you under his wing. In the back of your mind, however, you always wonder if he's going to take you out to some field and execute you like a feral animal.  

When he gives you your first weapon—a pocket knife—you realize that he cares at least somewhat about your survival.  

As you're walking the sewers after a month of travel he finally tells you about why he welcomed you into his group, and you begin to hate him.  

"Why did you even help me that day?" The rank water splashes up to your calves, and you would've thrown up long ago if your stomach wasn't empty.  

Joel sighs, helping you cross a gap you're too short to jump on your own. "Tommy had made a promise to your brother to keep you safe no matter what. I guess they were good friends or something." 

Your brother _was_ a decade your senior, so it doesn't seem that weird to you.  

You adjust your pack and follow behind him. "Then why -" 

"Look, (Name), _Tommy_ was the one supposed to look after you." You almost run into his back when he abruptly stops, yanks on the strap of his backpack, and sighs. "If I had a say, I woulda left you behind with your brother." 

It takes everything in your power not to drown him in sewage. "So I'm a charity case." 

He starts walking again, waving you off. "If that's what you wanna call it, kid." 

* * *

It's a little over two months into your journey to wherever the fuck Joel is taking you, and he still hasn't done much but grumble at you and help you climb things, hasn't even told you where in the fuck you guys are going. He's like a runner without the whole flesh-eating trait—a hollow body running on nothing but adrenaline all the time.  

After so long of the same question-evade-question-shush game the two of you have been playing, you've officially grown tired of it. It's when you ask a simple, non-probing question about where he's from (one that you've asked so many times) and he _still_ shushes you that you snap. You don't know one fucking thing about him besides his name and that he has a brother.  

"You know, at this point I would rather be walking around with a clicker. They're much better company," you hiss, jumping from car to car along the main road leading out of Santa Fe.  

The sun is blazing, having forced you to take your jacket off and run around in your loose-fitting tank. Even then the sweat pools into your lower back and rivulets tickle your stomach on their trek from between your breasts. Your hair sticks to the back of your neck and forehead, and you cry out when sweat drips into your eyes.  

"Well, next time we see one you can go with 'em," Joel retorts, mocking sarcasm in his tone that burns you as badly as the sun has.  

"I honestly don't know what your problem is with me," you say, wiping at your eyes with the front bottom of your shirt where it isn't dripping with sweat.  

"My problem is that you weren't even my job in the first place." 

You stop to catch your breath, suddenly rounding on him once you find your voice. You turn to find him standing on a hood a few cars back, his skin sweatslick and sleeves rolled up to his elbows to show his tan forearms, the first few buttons of his shirt surprisingly undone to reveal the dark chest hair beneath. You act like you don't notice, but the sight sends your stomach fluttering—you've noticed him and his experience for a while now. You're curious as to what his chest would feel like beneath your hands.  

No. Stop. You can't start to think shit like this, no matter how curious you are, so you burn that bridge from all the way back where you're standing.  

The sight of him exhausted and drained almost makes you not want to snap at him for what's he's been doing. Almost.  

You manage to slow your heart rate and smooth out your voice before you release all the pent-up anger you've had towards him. "Listen, I'm fucking sorry that I so happened to survive, but _I don't know what you want from me_! Tell me so I can fix it! Do you want me to leave? 'Cause I can if it'll make you feel better." You slide from the roof of the burning hot car and start shimmying your way through the traffic, ignoring his orders for you to _get back here_! 

The heat between the metal cars is stifling, and you make sure to avoid touching it, breathing a sigh of relief when you make it on the sidewalk. You understand that what you're doing is fairly childish and life-endangering, but you want to see just how far he'll go to look out for you. If what he was saying about leaving you behind is true.  

"(Name)! Get the fuck back here!" He's hopping from car to car in an attempt to reach you, and just for spite you turn around, still walking, and give him a nice wave.  

* * *

It doesn't take him long to find you, and when he does his fury boils over. You feel guilty to say that you like this better than him looking bored all the time.  

"What in the hell were you thinking?" he hisses at you, ducking under the low foundation of an apartment you crawled into. It's cold down here, and you sigh against the concrete wall cooling your sweaty back. 

"I was thinking that you didn't want me around." You can't help but feel hurt, bitter even at the thought of being alive because of someone else's pity, but the fact that he still followed after you, took the time to find you confused you to no end. What's going on through that man's head? You swear he's just one big fucking question. "So I left." 

"You know Tommy would _kill_ me if somethin' happened to you." 

"I thought you said I'm not your responsibility." You're going to get a confession out of him one way or another. "Listen, I don't know what's eating at you, but I can see it. And the more you let it feed off you, the worse you're gonna be. So can you just get it off your chest so we can move on?"  

"We ain't talkin' about this. Get up and let's go. We already wasted enough time 'cause you wanted to be all dramatic." He motions for you to come to him, so you open your bag, pull out a new magazine, and start reading about the celebrity faux-pas on every page and the new celebrity couple and oh look Beyon—

When he yanks the magazine from your hands and grabs you by the arm, you scream in protest at the exact same time he chooses to reprimand you.  

"Let me go!"  

"Stop actin' like a child and let's go!" 

He doesn't realize his own strength and one hard tug sends you careening forward, knocking you to your hands and knees.  

There's a pregnant silence as you kneel there, inspecting your scraped up palms from the gravel you so happened to fall into.  

"Don't you ever. Fucking. Touch me. Again," you whisper, picking up the magazine he had dropped with careful fingers. "I suggest you leave before it gets dark." 

He ignores your suggestion with a sigh and instead ducks over to the wall where your stuff is before settling down, a whisper of cloth making you turn your head.  

You hate him. God, how you want to hate him. He's so mean to you—so, so mean to you—and you've tried to make it right by him so many times these past two months, tried to impress him so he'll finally realize that you aren't absolutely worthless, tried to ask him questions about his life to show that you're interested in him, tried to make him laugh to show that you can make him happy for once. But none of that's worked. Yet here he is, still standing by you despite every effort you've made to get him to leave. Despite every sign telling you that he would rather you be dead. Why?  

You also ask yourself why you haven't left, but it doesn't take long for you to know the answer: he's your shield. The only thing you have to protect you against this world after your brother died. You can only respect him for doing everything he's done, yet it's hard to like the guy when he acts like you're his number one enemy ninety-nine percent of the time.  

 _But goddamn if that one percent doesn't make it all worth it_ , you confess begrudgingly.  

He starts making a pallet against the hard ground where the gravel is sparse to prevent any—ahem, _further_ —injury. There are a shit ton of blankets in a pile next to him, and a thoroughly confused expression colors your face.  

"What's with all the blankets?" 

"I thought you would wanna stay here, so while you were off finding a place to sulk I nabbed some sheets off an old bed. Figured you chose the worst place you could find, and I was right. Goddamn rocks everywhere." 

You can't help but smile at the complaint he throws in there, and while you want to be mad at him, you can't. You never can, because even though he's a fucking asshole, he does small things of consideration to show you that deep down, under all those layers of armor, he cares.  

"Instead of saying sorry for hurting me you make us a bed," you mutter, suddenly blushing at the implied double meaning of _us_ that only you understand.  

He grunts in response, moving to lay on one side with a folded blanket as a pillow. You have one, too. The fight to not give in is strong as hell, yet when he pats your side of the pallet you waste no time in getting over there, laying down onto your back. 

The simple layer of sheets is the best bed you've had in months since you and Joel have been on the road. He's not one for luxuries at all, chastising you when you lose sight of the main goal (even though you have no idea what that is) to go have a quick bath in a stream or lounge on a couch or eat your rations at a table again.  

"We both smell _awful_."  

He chuckles once, breath tickling your ear. "One of us need to keep—" 

You scoff in disbelief. "We're under some random house with an inconspicuous hole in the side that you could hardly see nevertheless barely even _fit_ through. I think we're good."  

"No sense in letting our guard down, (Name)." His voice is drowsy, and when you look over he's fast asleep, breathing even and the lines of his face softer. And for a moment you think that this is how he must've been before the outbreak, when the whole world didn't rest solely on his shoulders and people had actual funerals instead of coming back to life and eating their loved ones. It was a simpler time, one that you couldn't fully reminisce on given you were barely a teenager.  

God, you can't really remember your mother's voice.  

As the hours drone on and the sun finally dips, you find yourself _freezing fucking cold_. The whole thing about hot-as-balls days and below-zero nights rings true for New Mexico. The only problem is that Joel had the smart idea to use all the blankets for the bed and save none for an actual sheet to have when it eventually became cold, that eventually being now. His close proximity makes you uncomfortable and reassures you at the same time.  

You scoot in closer to him, marveling at the heat radiating from his skin. A shiver courses through you and you automatically seek out his body, curling into the warmth of his chest. You suddenly realize why he didn't think about saving a blanket—he's his own.  

In the cover of night, you run your fingers through his chest hair, humming at the feel of it under your touch. He never stirs.  

* * *

Joel continues to interest you and reel you in as the week passes. After your outburst he seems to be doing better, or at least not scowling as much.  

He obviously finds a guitar in the basement of the elderly couple's home you're currently rummaging through, as you can hear him start to strum a tune from your place in the kitchen before you move to the top of the steps. It's a Johnny Cash song. Your dad's favorite singer.  

"Do you sing, too?"  

Your presence startles him, and he uncharacteristically fumbles with the guitar, almost dropping it entirely. You descend the steps and sit in the rocking chair opposite him. Why there are rocking chairs in the _basement_ is a question you're dying to know.  

"Have long you been there?" He strums once and pats the side, causing the strings to vibrate.  

"I just got _here_ , but I heard you in the kitchen," you mutter, looking down to your hands at the picture frame of the elderly couple smiling under the Eiffel Tower. The city of love. You wish you could've seen it. "My dad really liked Johnny Cash. He had every record and cassette tape and CD that had the guy's name written on it." 

Joel lets out an amused breath, casting his gaze off to the corner of the room. "I'm guessing you're a big fan as well."  

"If I said _no_ my dad would reanimate yet again, find me, and rip my heart from my chest." 

He gives a short laugh at your jest and eventually starts to strum a tune.  

"Do you sing?" he asks over the sound of the song.  

You shrug. "I tried my hand at it when I was younger. Like every other kid I thought I could be a celebrity and make it big."  

He looks over at you with a kind gleam in his eyes and smiles. "Come on. I'm gonna need a June Carter for this one."  

You chuckle at his warmth towards you, a welcome break from his constant apathy.  

The look on his face makes you want to cry. He's so content with the world at this moment, focusing on nothing but the room you're in, and with the far away look in his eyes he's thinking about simpler times, about when he could sit down and just relax for a moment and enjoy life.  

Like what you're doing right now.  

You recognize the chords immediately: 'You Are My Sunshine' was one of your favorites as a kid. The melody resonates within the basement and it's as if all the world has gone quiet to listen. You can vaguely remember your mom singing it to you when you were little and crying, yet hearing her voice only made you cry harder, so she eventually stopped singing it altogether.  

But when Joel sings it, the heavens open and shine down upon you, and for the whole first verse and chorus you're mesmerized, tears blurring your vision as you sing backup when needed and listen when not, and he never opens his eyes, focusing on a forgotten memory so hard that lines form on his forehead.  

You pick up the second verse quickly, voice shaky at first from embarrassment, but the encouraging look in his gaze persuades you to sing like you used to when you were a kid and your parents and brother were still alive and you weren't traveling with a mysterious stranger that you were slowly growing attached to and— 

—suddenly you feel extremely silly for doing this.  

He joins you for the final chorus then sets the guitar back in its original place.  

"We'd better get going," he says with an exasperated sigh before leaving you to yourself in the basement.  

He has the fingers of a guitar player. 

Your curiosity towards him multiplies. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lemme know what ya think! Send good vibes and stuff.


	2. Firsts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's suffocating you. The murders. The Darkness. A visible symptom of the weight this new world tends to place upon people, takes their humanity and digs into their bones and turns their hearts into tar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the support on the first chapter????? I've been in the best mood since then because of it. <3

The first time you get a full view of the real world, without the shelter of your parents or brother, is when you're almost drowned by a smuggler for crossing into _his territory_. Joel shoots the man, knocks him to the side, and saves you at the last minute, lips against lips as he offers your lungs his breath, breaking your unconsciousness when he lays you onto your side as you start to cough up the water that filled your lungs.    

He rests a large hand against your back, seeping warmth into your soaked clothes and freezing skin. He helps you stand. You thank him and search the man laying dead at your feet. This time you don't flinch at the blood pooling around your sneakers. Blood is nothing new to you, just like death (even though you don't think you could never end someone's life), and instead reminds you to keep going, reminds you of what you don't want happening to you.    

You think of blood a _lot_.    

He calls your name and tells you to stop dilly dallying, that you need to get going if you're going to make it to Phoenix within a year. You laugh, the feeling of air in your lungs and humor on your tongue a pleasant reminder that you're still alive.    

* * *

In all of your short, danger-stricken years, you've never had to kill anyone. You simply survived, protected by your older brother's constant presence and mama bear tendencies. He had been your saving grace after your parents had died, taken you under his wing and raised you like his own, a man wise beyond his years.    

Because of all this, you've stayed soft, pacifistic in nature. It isn't in your bones or blood to kill like it is in Joel's or the more seasoned survivors. But especially Joel. He clears a camp faster than you thought possible, takes down guys with his wits and bare fists and if you thought he was a force to be reckoned with before, it was nothing compared to what you've seen these last few months.    

The first time you kill is when Joel's in immediate danger, nothing like before. You've never had to intervene like this, usually simple shouts to avert their attention or getting them to chase after you or throwing bottles at their heads always did the trick.    

The both of you count four men to clear out, and he does the dirty work while you take on the role of watchdog.    

You had miscalculated. Neither of you saw the fifth man hiding inside the building right next to your own hiding spot. When he stalks up to Joel, not spotting you yet, you panic. The man Joel had been fighting suddenly pins him to the ground and his gun is strewn a little ways away, his only weapon out of reach. He strains for it, and from here you can see the muscles of his arm working feverishly to clutch at the hilt of the pistol.   

You can't call to him because there's nothing he can do anyway. You have to take matters into your own hands.    

If there's one thing you're good at, it's sneaking. You manage to blindside the man stalking up to Joel and hop onto his back, driving the blade of your pocket knife into the side of his throat. Blood splatters onto your face and jacket and the heat from it rivals that of the blood pumping through your veins. You waste no time in jerking the blade from his neck and running over to grab Joel's gun, watching as his attacker looks up at you in surprise. You don't hesitate to pull the trigger. The shot goes clean through the other man's forehead and sends blood and brain matter sprawling upon the ground before the man follows, being pushed aside by Joel as he stands.    

"Oh shit," you breathe, kneeling into the dirt as you come down from your adrenaline high. Your stomach churns at the heat of the blood on your face and body, and you can't help but rest your hands on your knees and gag, as much as you will yourself not to—you might as well kill yourself before Joel does if you throw up your rations. "I didn't mean to, I swear. I just—"   

He jerks the gun from your trembling fingers and tucks it into his jeans, at the small of his back.    

"You shoulda stayed back. You could've gotten the both of us killed." Surprisingly, he isn't angry. More exhausted than anything else.  "We better go. That sound'll probably attract everything for miles."   

You quickly apologize. He doesn't say anything.    

* * *

The weight of your actions doesn't register until the both of you had already cleared the area and settled deep into the woods where the darkness hovers atop you like rocks upon your chest. It's suffocating you. The murders. The Darkness. A visible symptom of the weight this new world tends to place upon people, takes their humanity and digs into their bones and turns their hearts into tar. Like Joel. He has the Darkness - a terminal illness as far as you're concerned. He has no moral compass, no ability to connect with anybody, just solely focused on survival and nothing else. Not too different than the dead walking around, seeing as some of those with the Darkness also love to eat people.    

You're terrified of being enveloped.   

In the months you've been with him you've found that Joel loves nothing like he loves silence. You've always tried to strike up conversation after conversation with him and he's always shushed you, using excuse after excuse as to why you should keep silent, and you don't understand it. You're trying to connect with him, trying to make it less of a chore for him to have you around. You thought the talk back in New Mexico had cleared most of this tension you felt. Fuck, maybe he just doesn't like companionship, or maybe...   

"If I did anything for you to hate me between Santa Fe and now, I apologize," you say, poking what's left of the fire you started a few hours prior with a dampened branch. The woods seem to trap cold in like a blanket, and cover you it does. The fire takes what semblance of warmth you have when it finally fizzles out, nothing but ash and embers.    

"You ain't done nothing for me to hate you yet."    

You frown at the _yet_ he just had to put in there.    

"Then why—"   

He rolls over toward the tree the two of you are huddling under and grumbles, "It's your watch. Wake me up if you hear anything."    

When he falls asleep you find out that, while you don't really like the silence, it's more tolerable when it's shared between people. Now that your sense of sight had been taken by the darkness, your sense of sound is heightened so much that you can hear the leaves rustle with every exhale of Joel's breath. You start seeing shapes and fireworks dance in the darkness of your vision, start feeling ghost touches of the wiry hairs on his chest upon your fingertips, start hearing the rustling of branches and the wind howl and for a few hours the world is at peace.    

* * *

One thing that pisses you off to no end about that man is how early of a riser he is. As soon as he hears a bird fart, he's up and awake and ready to go. You always fight for an extra minute to stay in bed, never fully able to brace yourself for the horrors of the day.    

This morning, like every other morning, Joel rolls out of bed and immediately goes to relieve himself ( _pfft_ , if only it were so easy for girls). You take the opportunity to steal his spot and huddle under the blanket after you take your jacket off and re-situate your tank top, sighing in relief when warmth starts to circulate on your skin. It smells like him, and you pull the sheet up to your nose to familiarize yourself with his scent. The smell of a man, you think.    

"What're you doing?"    

His voice makes you jump, and you look up at him with wide eyes, the only facial feature he can see. He has his hands on his hips, and the aggravated look on his face makes you roll your eyes.    

"Joel, it's cold as hell out here and I feel awful. At least wait to yell at me until _after_ the birds wake up."    

"You were supposed to be keeping watch."   

"Oh my God, fine." You throw the blanket off of your form and reach for the rifle, shivering when the freezing wind cuts through your tank and yawns against your now-bare arms and shoulders. "Since you won't stop bitching."    

What in the hell _were_ you doing? Showing even more interest in him? No. No no no no that won't do. You can't do this to yourself. You know how this ends. You know.    

Yet you can't help but smile when thinking about that grumpy old man always huffing and grumbling under his breath. He was... experienced. Much more than you, considering he's probably fifteen years your senior—shit, you're barely twenty. Since the time in the basement and him strumming the guitar with practiced fingers and the feeling of his chest under the brush of your fingertips back under the apartment, your curiosity has blossomed to overgrown proportions, as well as your guilt. This whole time he's dragged you around without a second thought, even though you aren't even his responsibility—you're his brother's. And for you to lust after him behind his back like this? It's fucking wrong and you know it, but you can't stop until you know, whether it be from him or some other man.    

"Hey, Joel," you say, surveying the trees as you white-knuckle the hunting rifle in your hands. His only answer is a hum in response as he tries to start another fire at your feet, and in a moment of confidence you cast your eyes to him. "Do you really think you could've left me behind?" The question you've been dying to know since he told you.   

He huffs, lolling his head to the side to look at you in annoyance. "Can't you see I'm busy?"   

You let out a fuming breath, questioning your own sanity at how you can feel any sort of fondness for such a hateful man. But how can't you after spending every waking and sleeping moment with him? You have each other's backs, and you trust one another. Yeah, you can hardly believe it yourself, but he wastes no time in asking you to be his eyes and ears to make sure he doesn't get blindsided again, to go check out buildings and makes sure they're safe; he gives you weapons and lets you carry the less heavy stuff like the food and first-aid supplies, and you think that it takes quite a bit of trust in someone to willingly put so much of your life in their hands.    

His soft _no_ brings you from your thoughts.    

"No, what?"    

He runs a hand down his face and stares into the growing flames of the fire he finally got started.    

"To the question you asked earlier: if I could've left you behind. No."   

The many guards you had just brought down makes you dizzy. You can see the vulnerability in his eyes, hidden behind a poorly-crafted poker face. You see him now, actually see him for the first time. He's lost and sad and bitter at the world and you almost reach over to touch his shoulder in comfort, but you stop yourself, as his mask is put back on in that same moment.    

"Well, if it's any consolidation, thank you."    

The first touch of his large hand against you, calloused fingers splayed along your back and warmth seeping into your goose-fleshed skin from his palm, makes your heart flutter. His hands—you've always noticed how large they are compared to your own, and maybe it's because you're so small in comparison that everything about him seems bigger, but the heat seeping from his skin into yours pools down into your belly. And for a second you wonder what else he can do with them, where else he can put them, and you shove away your overgrown curiosity surrounding him.    

It's not your fault that he's the first attractive man you've been around that wasn't family or close friends since you hit puberty. And the longer you go without answers, the more your curiosity towards sex grows. It just so happens that he's the only man unknowingly contending to teach you, and with each of his touches your need to _know_ will grow until it's swallowed you whole.    

No! He's _comforting_ you. Assuring you that you aren't all that bad to be around when you know it to be the opposite because how can you be a good person and think such thoughts about someone, especially at a time like this, especially when he has no idea about your growing curiosity? Toward someone who's been saving your life and providing for you all this time more than your own father ever did. You feel as if you're betraying him...   

He doesn't know. God, he doesn't know. He's so ignorant as to the seed of curiosity he's planting inside you, and maybe that's a good thing. But you still think he needs to know, to let him decide if he still wants to carry you around after knowing of your pining, to keep both of you from heartbreak in the end.    

"No problem, kid," he grumbles, turning back to the flames, and you shake your head because all he knows how to do is fucking _grumble_.    

The rest of the morning is spent in an actually comfortable silence, and you find that _this_ silence is your favorite of all.    

* * *

When he finally tells you where he's from—Texas, but you assumed he lived in the south because of his accent, much like your own—you immediately start cracking jokes about the place. You can tell that this time he's actually annoyed, but the irritated look on his face just spurs you on.    

"So, did you work as a cowboy, or...?" you ask him, turning to look at him as you continue walking backwards along the desolate back road you had found.    

At this point you're sure—no matter what Joel says—that the two of you are just going where the wind takes you, floating along like leaves in a stream, no set goal in mind or any place you have to be. It makes you feel free.    

"Hush it up and turn back around before you fall," he huffs, coaxing you along with a swinging motion of his arm, as if he were trying to corral horses or something—oh. Ha. "At least I ain't from Kentucky."    

It's very rare for Joel to follow along and trade playful jests with you, but when he does you can tell he's been thinking of saying them for a long time.    

This is when he gives you your first nickname: _Hillbilly_. You cringe when he says it, unable to think of any sweet burns other than calling him _Pappaw_. He points a warning finger at you and you start to jog away from him. You make it back to the main road where a large green sign greets you.    

 _Phoenix: 138 Miles_    

You let out a monstrous groan and turn back to look at a panting Joel.    

"I'm gettin' too old for this," he groans, leaning down to place his hands on his knees.    

"We got a lot more walking to do, so you'd better prepare yourself." You point over at the sign and grin when he lets out a string of colorful expletives.    

He gives you a determined look. "We are finding a _car_."    

The two of you eventually do, surprised when the thing actually works and the radio turns on.    

"I wanna drive this time," you tell him, moving past him to climb into the driver's seat.    

He raises a curious brow. "You know how to drive a stick shift?"   

"No, but I can learn."    

You expect him to say no, surprised when he actually agrees to teach you. He comments that you're so poor at it he's glad for once that the outbreak happened so there are no cars around. You give him the middle finger, and he tells you to keep both hands on the wheel.    

It takes you a few days before you can finally get the hang of it, and by that time you're already in Phoenix. The sun is just as hot, the danger just as prominent, but you rely on each other to make it through the city.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lemme know what you think, and everyone have an amazing 4th of July! Don't dick around with fireworks!


	3. Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Just lemme see." 
> 
> "No." 
> 
> He huffs in annoyance and shakes his head. "Fine. What in the hell is bothering you so bad that you gotta know?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so today's my birthday and what better way to celebrate turning 18 than with some good ole ~daddy Joel~
> 
> ENJOY YOU GUYS

The University of Phoenix seems almost unreal to you. It's huge, spanning miles across the city. Even with the broken glass littering the streets and garbage strewn everywhere, it's a masterpiece. Those things just add character.   

You hear Joel's footsteps as he ambles up to stand beside you. "Nice, ain't it?"  

"It's amazing. The college in my town was four buildings and a fountain in the middle." You cast your gaze to the glass crunching underfoot. "Too bad this place is ruined."  

He takes you by the upper arm and pulls you forward, silently ordering for you to start walking, and you quickly shake him off with an _I get the message_ look.  

"I always wanted to go to college. I remember going to my brother's graduation and being so amazed at the buildings and the people and everything. It was like a small town." You sigh and turn to look at him. "Did you ever go to college?"  

His jaw sets and he looks at you out of the corner of his eye. "We'd better find some place to set up."  

Sharing time is over it seems, but by now you've gotten so used to his evasions that you simply shrug it off and move onto something else, but the curiosity is still there. You can't help but want to know everything about him.  

* * *

The college is a problem in and of itself. The hallways and classrooms are riddled with infected, holes busted through walls and floors—the whole place is a recipe for disaster. Yet you somehow make it your mission to traverse the landscape and reach the top of the highest building on campus to get a good view. It's when you find out that bloaters are very much real.   

Joel's too busy rummaging through drawers in student dressers and flipping mattresses to hear the heavy footsteps coming from down the hall. Headed your way.   

You're quick to shut the door as quietly as you can, and by that point Joel asks you what the hell you think you're doing. It's the second time you snap at him.   

"If you would stop jumping down my throat and listen for two fucking seconds you would realize that something big is headed towards us!" you hiss, looking around the room for a way out. There's a window next to the bunk beds on the far wall, but the drop would kill you both instantly. "We have to get out of here. They'll find us—"  

Realization suddenly springs to his face. "(Name)." Joel grabs your frantic form by the arm and drags you into the room where the shower is. Thank fuck you were in one of the four-person rooms on campus. "It's a bloater. Not a human."  

The enclosed space Joel's tucked you both into just makes the whole situation worse, but despite your nerves, you sink to the cold floor in relief.   

"Okay, but can bloaters bust down doors?"  

You can't see his face through the darkness, but when he speaks he sounds as if there's an amused smile on his face. "The day that infected start being able to open doors will be the day humanity is sorely fucked."   

The footsteps grow closer, at one point being directly next to you through the wall, and you almost burst out laughing once you hear how the poor creature is breathing.   

"(Name), shut the hell up."  

It isn't until the bloater passes that you can finally dig your face into the crook of your elbow and cackle. When the door opens and light cuts into your eyes, you look over at an unamused Joel towering above you.  

"Hillbilly, come on. We can't stay here all day."  

"Joel, it sounded like a pug with emphysema!" you cry out, unable to hold in your humorous observation any longer.   

You don't miss his surprised short laugh at your joke. It takes _you_ by surprise. Joel never laughs. It's a nice sound. He should do it more often.  

* * *

It's one thing to hear a bloater, but to actually come face-to-face with it is a different story. Now that Joel knows they're here, he's on a constant look-out for them. And the place just so happens to be swarming with infected.   

On the whole journey through the rest of the campus, Joel does nothing but complain. _Why in the hell are there so many infected around here, oh you just had to sight-see didn't you, who thought it was a good idea to go to Phoenix anyway?_   

At this point you're through with his nagging. "You! The one who's—"  

You start when he presses a hand to your mouth and pulls you to his chest, warmth from the sun on his shirt and his body heat seeping into your back.   

You wince when he cranes his head down and breathes into your ear with each word he speaks and his beard brushes against your skin. It makes you shiver. "Shush it. There's a bloater and a few clickers around the corner."  

The close proximity of your bodies makes you want to squirm. It's too weird, too intimate, too may-lead-to-something-else-but-only-in-your-head. Too _hot_ , and not the good kind. By this point the two of you have been walking around for hours, and Phoenix heat is fucking ruthless, even inside the buildings. It's as if buckets of boiling water are being poured into the air and made to sit there while you and Joel walk around.   

He finally releases you once discerning that you aren't going to get the both of you killed, but the drawn-out body contact dizzies you. You gulp down the million questions running through your mind, all completely sexual and distasteful and inappropriate. He nudges for you to follow along, and you do so on autopilot, mind up in the what-if clouds somewhere, and if only he knew the hole he keeps digging the both of you every time he... fuck, every time he shows he _cares_ about you.   

And that's when you finally realize that this curiosity you have has taken itself way too far.  

* * *

Joel's dead set on not resting, and when it gets to the point to where you have to stagger to catch his weight—and your own—when he almost keens over from the heat, you take it upon yourself to drag the two of you into a maintenance room in one of the nearby buildings. Even when you lower him onto a chair next to the door to let him rest, he still gripes.   

"(Name), I'm fine. We gotta keep moving if we wanna be out of here before dark."  

You scoff at his stubbornness and lower yourself onto shaking-from-exhaustion knees, reach into the side pocket of his pack to pull out his canteen.   

"Here," you say, forcing it into his hand. "You need to rest."  

He shakes his head at you and takes a long swig of water. "Just gimme a sec to recuperate."  

You untie your jacket from around your waist and use it to blot away the excess sweat on your face, and you pause, look at how pale the poor man is before wiping his brow, too. You toss it to the side, realizing that you won't need to keep warm any time soon, nor will you be traveling for a few more hours.  

He says nothing to protest your help this time, simply rests an elbow on his knee and presses his forehead into his hand once you're done. You crack open the door and peek out to see if anything is coming. _Now_ is the time to stock up on some food. The heat is sucking every calorie out of you as soon as you can get it in.   

He kicks you in the hip with the side of his boot, and you whip your head around to snap at him.   

"Reach me that bucket over there," he mutters before you can open your mouth.   

As soon as it meets his hands and before you can ask him why he needs it, he pulls it to his face and starts throwing up the water he had been sipping on all day. He had told you that you could only save what food you had for breakfast. The rations in his stomach were long gone.   

He finally lets out a long sigh once his bout of nausea passes and sets the object onto his lap, folding his arms on top of it.   

"Joel, I hate to tell you this, but you got heat exhaustion."  

" _Bullshit_ ," he hisses. "'m just a little sick is all."  

Instead of arguing with him you stand up and slip back out into the blaring sun. If he's smart, he won't follow or stop you, because the two of you need food more than anything. It seems as if the more you collect the faster it gets eaten.   

You decide to evade the bulk of the university completely, instead sticking to the outer buildings where infected are scarce. The few that you do find are easy to evade. 

You find a boy with pretty brown eyes who tells you he likes your freckles before he tries to kill you. A spray of blood coats your face when you're forced to stab him in the side of the neck. You kneel down and dry heave at the tangy smell of copper lingering in the air. 

In an hour or so of searching every nook and cranny, the amount of food that you find is surprising. You suspect it's because nobody can get in with all the infected roaming around. When you get back to the room where Joel is, you find that he's left his place on the chair and is curled up in the corner, your forgotten jacket resting over his head and his backpack resting under it.   

"Joel," you whisper, setting your own pack onto the now-empty chair. "Are you dead?"  

"You were right," you hear him grumble. His honesty is surprising.   

"I got you some food. It'll help with the nausea, hopefully," you say, sifting through your bag to find a few rice cakes you'd found in a dead girl's backpack… The poor girl didn't even have time to make it out of her _house_ before she was eaten alive. 

He turns around and lifts your jacket away from his eyes, hums at you and takes one of them. He must be feeling pretty awful to accept so much of your help like this. 

“Be sure to keep drinking water. Hopefully that'll help flush all this out of your system.” 

He bring the food up to his mouth before stopping to assess your standing form. “You got blood on you… Tell me you didn't come back bit.” 

You shake your head and tell him about the boy with the pretty brown eyes and the Darkness in his heart. Who tried to kill you but was outsmarted and you feel so guilty for driving the blade through the thin flesh of his neck. 

A shiver courses through you. “The noise it made… fuck. Like somebody was slicing up steak or something.”  

A long silence drifts between the two of you before you can finally calm down.  

"Ya did what you had to, kid. Survival should be the only thing you think about now, ‘cause it’s either you or them,” he mutters, turning back around to lay his head on his pack and re-place your jacket over his eyes. 

You sag your shoulders, settle into the chair to wait for the shelter of the moon. 

* * *

By nightfall, Joel is back to his normal headstrong self, showing no interest nor memory toward what happened.  

You ask him if he feels better, and he simply nods his head.  

When he eventually allows you to sleep while he keeps watch, you dream. Of hands and freckled shoulders and tanned skin and a gruff voice telling you _we have to be quiet they might hear us._ And by the time you wake up you’re aching between your thighs, can't meet his eyes all morning in fear of pouncing on him. You shouldn't want to pounce on him. It's the guiltiest you've felt in a long while, even worse than killing the brown-eyed boy. 

When he asks if you're okay, since you never wake up on your own, your cheeks flush, and you tell him it was a bad dream. You don't think he believes you. 

* * *

When you finally bring up the courage to touch his watch—he guards the damn thing with his life, and you're extremely curious as to the story behind it and how he'll react—he clutches your wrist in his hand and squeezes so tightly you cry out.  

"Don't _ever_  do that," he says, voice even and dangerous, and it's the first time you're actually terrified of him. 

When he lets you go and continues to ready dinner over the campfire, you crawl over to the other side of the fire and clutch your wrist to your chest. It hurts. You sniffle.  

"(Name), I didn't grab you that hard," he huffs.  

You don't say anything.  

With a sigh he gets up and walks over to you, plops down next to you. You turn away from him. When he lays a hand on your shoulder, you shake it off.  

"I don't mean to hurt you, alright? But you gotta stop being so nosy all the time."  

You look back at him incredulously. "So it's my fault that I actually wanna get to know the guy I've been traveling with for almost five months?" 

"Just lemme see." 

"No." 

He huffs in annoyance and shakes his head. "Fine. What in the hell is bothering you so bad that you gotta know?" 

You shake your head, explain to him that it's nothing specific, that you just want to know about him. What he was like before.  

"Do you have any family other than Tommy?" 

You notice that he immediately freezes up, the blood draining from his face. He answers you in a cautious voice. "Just him."  

"What's your favorite color?" 

"Green."  

He stands up and walks to the other side of the fire, continuing with dinner as you keep quizzing him.  

"Favorite food?" 

"I would absolutely kill for a scoop of Rocky Road right about now." 

You chuckle, refreshed at his dry humor, since the only thing he's been doing since Phoenix is mope around. Maybe he still feels sick or something. 

"Did you have a job?" 

"Yup." 

"What was it?" 

"Carpentry." 

"My pappaw was a carpenter. It's hard work."  

He nods and motions for you with an arm. "Come on over here and get something to eat. You can quiz me later." 

* * *

He's made you completely curious now, ordinary acts turned completely sensual because you're curious—about what a man's touch feels like, what a man's lips or beard or body feel like (either when touched or touching you). You want to know if what you felt in your dream is anything compared to the real thing. 

You're inexperienced, yes, but you aren't naïve. You've read about those things in books, seen magazines full of pretty naked girls posing and pretty naked girls having sex. You aren't like them, though, not one ounce of confidence or experience to strike up a conversation about the topic, about where his hands and lips and body have been, about what they would feel like on yours.   

But you do have the courage to ask him minor things, always while you're in a car and him paying attention to the road is more important than paying attention to your blushing face and probing questions, so you're able to get away with it. Any other time he shuts you down before you can get the full question out of your mouth.   

"How was sex before the outbreak?" Your voice is meek, almost hidden by the rumble of the truck.   

Oh, he hears it.   

He runs a hand down his face and glances at you out of the corner of his eye. You're too busy reading your magazine to notice. "Why are you asking stupid questions like that?"   

"It just seems like everybody has sex with just about anyone nowadays. Nobody's safe." You shrug your shoulders, looking up at him. "The small pleasures in life, I guess. The whole _we could die tomorrow so let's find any happiness we can_ kinda attitude." You know you should stop it there, but your mouth acts before your brain can stop it. "You ever had that kinda attitude before?"  

"That's enough, (Name). I'm too tired for this." He finalizes your conversation and your own thoughts in just a few words.   

He hasn't had that attitude for a while, even before the outbreak.  

Your amused laugh makes him look at you yet again. "What?"   

"Maybe that's why you're so stressed and grumpy."   

The surprised look on his face maps itself into your memory, because moments like this—of little displays of emotion from him—are very rare and very hard to come by.   

The rumbling chuckle in his chest startles you, but when he mutters a _may_ _be_ under his breath, your stomach flips.    

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know the drift: give me feedback and all that good stuff. I'm gonna go party, and by "party" I mean eat a lot of chocolate and play video games. :')


	4. Mistakes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You make a mistake: going out without Joel to scavenge while he stays back in the apartment and sleeps, which he desperately needs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The support for the first few chapters of this story has been overwhelming. Thank everyone so much for the kind words and the feedback that lets me know I'm doing everything right. It's been very inspirational.
> 
> My grandmother is having a hip replacement, so I'll be in the hospital with her for the next few days. I figured I might as well update early since the chapter's already finished.

The next town you come to is already overrun with chaos, the windshield of your borrowed truck immediately being shot out as you pull onto the main street. Joel yells at you to duck down and adrenaline thumps in your ears. You dig what glass you can out of your hands before your companion instructs you to climb over the center console and meet him on the driver side where he's opened the door, using it as a shield against the barrage of bullets that whiz past your head as you hurry your way over to him.  

The two of you duck around the bed of the truck, you shaking your head when he signals for you to seek refuge inside the abandoned boutique. The look in your eyes convey that you aren't leaving him, and you don't back down at the warning glare he gives you.  

Instead he instructs you to sneak around and silently take them out while he and a group of other survivors you had suddenly spotted distract them. Okay. You can do that.  

It's after you take down the fifth person that you find a duffle bag with an assortment of weapons and first-aid items. You hide it as best you can and make a mental note to bring Joel back here later.  

After the group takes down half the hunters, the rest of them flee back into the town, and you finish searching the convenience store you've found yourself in, not hearing him call your name. Three times.  

"(Name), what in the hell are you doing?" You knew it was him just by the sound of his footsteps, so you make no effort to look back.  

"Looking for loot," you say, easing yourself onto a rickety shelf to reach a high up box that looked promising.  

"I've been looking for you for ten minutes." He lets out a calming breath. "That scared the hell outta me." 

You toss the box to the floor with a defeated sigh and turn back to look at him. He's covered in blood, and the bruise already springing up under his eye makes you frown.  

"Sorry. Didn't hear you."  

As you walk past him he places a hand on your shoulder to stop you.  

"Ya did the right thing." You know immediately what he's talking about—killing those people, who had possible children or spouses they went home to every day, who were possibly good people simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.  

"I know," you whisper, not bothering to look over at him. "Come on. I found something you'd like to see." 

You've never seen Joel so fucking surprised before about anything. His eyes widen before a disbelieving laugh rumbles in his chest.  

"Where on God's green Earth did you get this?" 

You step aside to let him kneel and sift through the contents, saying, "The last hunter I killed had it on her. Figured I should show it to you." 

"Goddamn, this'll set us up for _months_."  

The two of you thank the survivors that helped you and set off to find a place to make camp. At sundown you find the perfect apartment on the top floor of a complex, with a window in the living room for keeping watch, which is decided that you'll do first since Joel had driven for hours while you had rested in the car.  

Joel remarks that there are even sheets on the bed, a luxury everyone had taken advantage of before the outbreak. Now everything has such a layer of dust and grime and filth on it that most of the time you opt to sleep with nothing covering or under you at all. At this point the ground looks more tempting ninety percent of the time.  

* * *

You make a mistake: going out without Joel to scavenge while he stays back in the apartment you're squatting in and sleeps, which he desperately needs. But this town is obviously a goddamn _gold mine_ for supplies, which you can never have enough of. You have a feeling that the reason behind the vast amount of loot is more sinister: the gang lurking in town. 

Everything's calm for the first hour as you gather some much-needed items, but when you cut through an alley to get quickly through town and back to Joel, things turn to shit.  

You don't hear the footsteps approaching, muffled by your own, and the arm that suddenly covers your face makes you immediately start squirming under their hold.  

"You finally came out without the old man, huh?" the man holding you jeers, wrapping his other arm around your shoulders to keep you in place.  

Another man circles around you and strikes your gut hard with the butt of his rifle, causing you to double over as the breath leaves your lungs in a rush and the man lets you go. 

"You have things that we want," the man with the gun says as he circles around your kneeling form, running his fingers up and down your spine. "Things that you _took from us_." As he speaks he fists a hand in your hair and yanks your head back before striking you hard in the face, pain shooting through your nose. "And until we get them, you're gonna stay here for as long as it takes."  

"I don't know what you're talking about," you cry, sucking in a deep breath through your mouth. Your nose might be broken.   

One of the men pushes you fully to your knees before driving a pocket knife into your left thigh. It's so random and confusing that your brain takes a moment to register the pain, but when it does... Your screams are muffled by the hand covering your mouth, and you don't realize how much the removal of the object hurts more than the stabbing itself.  

"Where are the two of you set up?" the man growls, and suddenly you can see him under the moonlight once your vision sharpens again. A crooked nose, slicked back dark hair, piercing blue eyes. They're the prettiest color you've ever seen, but you see the Darkness living in them. "Answer me!"  

The hand covering your mouth drops. "I won't let you get to him," you grunt weakly, blood seeping from your thigh and staining your pant leg, pooling onto the ground.  

You stare down at the red puddle shining under the light of the moon and think back to when you were almost drowned. You can't and won't let that happen to you. You need to keep going. _You think about the blood._  

" _(Name), get up_." Joel's voice resonates next to your ear, and you swear you can feel his breath on your skin. You turn your head to look around but he's nowhere to be found. " _You have to get_ _outta_ _here. I'm right with you. You can do it, Hillbilly._ "  

You take heed to his words and slowly start crawling forward, the adrenaline coursing through your veins snuffing out the pain in your thigh as you continue to bleed.  

The men simply laugh at your lousy attempt to escape and you see their feet as they walk next to you.  

You feign exhaustion and pretend to clutch onto your aching stomach as you pull the switchblade from your pocket, your actions covered by the shadows cast from their bodies. It flicks open and you muffle the sound with a rough cough. As soon as one of the men reach down to grab you, you drive the blade up under the man's chin, grimacing as blood showers upon your head and runs down your face in one long stream, momentarily clouding your vision. The other man with the pretty blue eyes suddenly drops, landing right in front of you. He weakly clutches on to your dropped wrist and you watch the light fade from those eyes before spotting the arrow sticking out from his head. The man you killed sits crumpled against the brick wall, and you close the blade before tucking it back into your pocket.  

A woman, skin a golden brown, whom you suspect was the one who shot the blue-eyed man, greets you at the end of the alley, hands raised to show that she means no harm. You use the wall to support yourself as you hobble over to her, both the severe pain from the wound in your leg and the stench of pure copper all around you churning your stomach.  

She rushes over to you, wraps one of your arms around her shoulders and helps you stagger over to a bench where you're able to sit.  

"Listen, I have to get back. My friend—" The deep concern in her brown eyes forces you to glance away. "—he'll be looking for me." 

You don't understand what she says because your mouth starts to water and a sweat breaks out along your forehead, and you barely have enough time to lean over the side of the bench before you vomit, emptying the minimal contents of your stomach. Joel's gonna fucking kill you. That was the only food you were able to spare until the day after next.  

You hear approaching footsteps as you wipe your mouth with your sleeve, but make no effort to turn and see who it is. You can barely keep your eyes open.  

"We got the location, Heidi! And numbers."  

The woman reaches over to rub soothing circles into your back, a ring on her finger running over your spine like a xylophone. "Tone it the hell down, Marcus. Do you want every hunter in the goddamn town to hear you?" 

"Uh... no. Sorry." 

You feel the bench shift under her weight as she stands up, never taking her hand off your back. 

"We need to get this girl some help. She's been—" 

"I got her." Your ears perk up at the gruff sound of Joel's voice, unknowing of where he'd come from, yet you can't will your head to raise even when he kneels in front of you and rests a hand on your thigh. Even through your pain you can't help but to think about how nice it feels. 

"Oh, it's you," Heidi says, sudden surprise in her smooth voice. 

"We found him questioning one of the guys working for Zack. Apparently _she's_ who he was looking for." 

"Appreciate the help, bud," Joel says, too preoccupied with looking you over that he doesn't hear the man's offended scoff.  

He unzips your jacket and uses it to wipe the blood from your face and hands before helping you sit up straight after being slouched against the side of the bench, ready to get sick again at a moment's notice.  

Heidi gets Joel's attention, says that when he's ready to take down Zack and his goons, he knows where to find her. You hear a pair of footsteps slowly fade into silence. They're gone.  

"Jesus, why did you go alone?" he whispers, attempting to keep his outburst tucked under his tongue. You aren't in any condition to deal with a lecture right now.  

"I just wanted to be useful," you mutter, too exhausted to wipe away the defeated tears staining your cheeks.  

"You _are_ useful. You don't gotta go getting yourself into danger to prove it."  

"I'm sorry," you murmur, too exhausted to argue. "I got some supplies, at least." 

* * *

You don't know when you finally pass out, but when you wake up you're fully bathed, laying in a bed with fresh sheets and snuggled up in a warm nightgown. You can't feel the pain in your leg. When you walk into the kitchen, Joel's there eating breakfast at the table. He smiles at you once he notices you and asks if you had a good night's rest. 

You wake up, and the body pressed against you surprises you. A shiver of fear courses through your body when you hear his mumble of "Mornig'," when you realize that it's _Joel_ behind you and you're both naked and clean and laying in a soft bed with white sheets. He kisses you on the shoulder. You smile.  

You wake up, and this time you're strapped to a table and tortured. You can't feel any teeth in your mouth. All of your fingers are gone. They take your tongue.  

* * *

You wake yourself with your own gasps of breath, and with a suddenly relieved sigh you realize that you aren't in any of those situations. You're in a dingy bedroom with dust-ridden bed sheets and blood under your nails and in your hair. Your clothes are still on, save for your jacket, and the hellish pain in your thigh is as alive as ever.   

You look down and notice the wound covered in bloody gauze. Your whole body feels _gross_. The dried blood on your pant leg has turned the material crunchy to the touch, disgustingly enough.  

"You're awake!" a chipper voice says as they walk through the doorway and sit down next to you on the bed. You look up and see a petite girl with an unnaturally clean blue dress that contrasts well with her golden brown skin. God, she doesn't look ten years old. She tucks unruly dark curls behind her ear and looks over at you. "How're you feeling?" 

You give her a small smile in greeting before saying, "Better, all thanks to you, I'm guessing."  

The smile that brightens her face makes you realize that these are the people you have to fight for: the kids, whose innocence have already been spoiled by the uglies of the world. It's these moments that make you want to keep living.  

The woman named Heidi walks in, asking the girl to fetch you a drink of water.  

"Apologies. That's my daughter, Maya," she says, softness in her eyes as she pulls a chair over to your bed. "It's very rare that she sees new people around here that don't want to kill her." 

You give her a slight smile, the pain in your thigh increasing tenfold when you move to sit up, Heidi holding onto your arm to steady you.  

"She's really sweet. She looks a lot like you." 

"Oh, you should've seen her dad." The both of you laugh, hers of the more reminiscing, wish-you-were-here kind, and she shakes her head to seemingly clear some upsetting thoughts. "How ya holding up so far?" 

You're taken aback by how compassionate this woman has already been to you and is still continuing to be. The fact of the matter is that both of you are on a first name basis and know nothing about each other. But she doesn't care. She's worrying after you like a mother hen.  

"It's been shit, to be honest. I wasn't ready for this." 

She lays a calming hand on your shoulder. "None of us were. But we gotta find something to fight for in this world so we don't give up." 

Her words ring in your ears, as if you're standing inside a bell tower. _Find something to fight for._  

Silence passes between the two of you as you try to rack your brain for that very thing. You come up empty. "What if the only thing you had left to live for is dead?" 

The hand on your shoulder squeezes down, and you look over at her.  

"Then you find something else. Give that man downstairs something to live for, because, trust me, he needs it. Then you _can't_ bring yourself to die."  

The determined look in her eyes becomes too much, and you're forced to look down at the bandage on your leg. Since Maya is taking so long the both of you decide to head downstairs and see what the hold up is. Heidi says you need to see Joel anyways. She helps you to the first floor before you can protest. 

What you don't expect is Maya talking animatedly with Joel about a princess and a castle with a dragon as a guard, and him listening. Intently. He hums at the right times and makes surprised faces and hits all the notes that make you wonder if he's done this before. The guy's just too damn good at it.  

Heidi elbows you, and the both of you suppress a chuckle. She looks at her daughter. 

"Hey, Maya, let Joel and (Name) have a little privacy."  

The girl huffs at her mother and reluctantly follows her into the kitchen.  

Joel looks over at you with weary eyes, a new sunburn and fresh freckles across his cheeks.  

"How ya doing, kiddo?"  

You lean against the banister, your hurt leg lifted so all of your weight befalls on the other.  

"I'm a little beat, but I'll be fine." You give him a tired, hopeful smile.  

He stands from the couch and offers you a glass of water before sitting back down. "Heidi and her group offered us to stay at their hideout for a few days, but they were waiting to move us until after you woke up." 

You take a gulp and relish at the water's soothing of your dry throat.  

"Have you caught those guys yet?" you ask between sips.  

He lets out a dejected sigh. "No. They keep on the move. Me and Marcus've been out from dawn 'til dusk tryna find them for the past few days." 

"How long've I been out?" you ask, hobbling over to the couch before relaxing into the cushion. 

"About three days." 

"Goddamn." 

"Yeah. We were wondering if you were gonna wake up." The solemness in his voice makes you wince. _Give that man downstairs something to live for, because he needs it._  

You look over at him and lightly punch his arm to lighten the mood.  

"You won't be getting rid of me that easy, Cowboy." 

He chuckles, turns his head to look at you and pats you on your good knee. "Whatever you say, Hillbilly." 

* * *

It takes longer than both of you had expected before you can even put _weight_ on your leg. Heidi says that the man missed all major arteries and tendons and it's just the muscle that has to recuperate.  

Joel starts to get antsy and more pissy with every day you stay inside Heidi's bunker, blowing up on you more than once when you ask him to help you with things. It's disquieting.  

Heidi, however, is perfectly happy for you two to stay, but especially you. Maya has taken to you like white on rice, the little girl following your every move. It's nice, though, to have someone friendly and talkative follow you around, even if it is a ten-year-old girl. But she's hilarious and witty and she can sing amazingly, so you're caught on more than one occasion singing duets to famous songs.  

As you start to get better, you wonder if Joel will eventually leave you, and for once since the two of you have been together, that isn't such a scary thought. Heidi has said on multiple occasions that you'll always have a home here, with her and her ragtag group of friends and family, and you're guilty to say that you actually consider the offer now that Joel has started to push you away. As if he almost wants you to hate him so he _can_ leave you behind.  

It's when you and Joel sit down alone for a dinner of rice and beans that you ask him. But by the time you work up the courage to do so he only has a few bites left. You've barely eaten anything.  

"Joel." He hums in response, refusing to look up at you. "What if I told you I wanted to... stay here?"  

He pauses in the middle of chewing his last bite and looks up at you, a flash of defeat in his eyes before he returns to normal.  

"I'd say do whatever you want," he grumbles, getting up from the table with his empty bowl in hand.  

He leaves you in a somber silence. You don't touch your food.  

* * *

In a few weeks you're finally able to walk again, albeit with a limp. The more time you spend with Maya and Heidi, the more Joel ignores you. For a moment you're happy, because maybe he can finally move on from you. _Or maybe it's the other way around._   

Joel announces that he'll be leaving first thing tomorrow, and for a second your throat aches because he doesn't say _we'll_.  

Heidi takes you aside to her bedroom and sits you down, taking you by the shoulders.  

"(Name), listen, as much as we would love for you to stay, as much as _you_ would love to stay, you belong with him. No matter if he wants to admit it or not, he needs you." 

You search her gaze for any semblance of a jest, then sigh when you find nothing but severity and solemness.  

"Heidi, I—" you shake your head, "—how do you know?" 

She gives you a mild smile. "'Cause I've been around the block a few times, kiddo." Her demeanor suddenly turns serious, and she moves to cradle your face in her hands. "Listen, I know that you think letting him go is the best thing for you both, but it's not. Trust me." 

It's silent for a moment before you nod your head, tears blurring your vision at the prospect of leaving what might be your only opportunity at peace.  

You hate him for it, but you know you couldn't let him leave you behind if you tried.  

* * *

The next morning, you share hugs and tears and thanks with your new friends. Maya orders you to promise her that you'll see her again. Heidi comments with a warm grin that she has a feeling you will.  

You gape at the different-every-morning sunrise as you and Joel head out yet again, the experience in this town showing you that no destiny is set in stone. That nobody is guaranteed another day and nobody is safe from the horrors of the world.  

But there are some people that make it a lot more bearable. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys know the drill: leave me feedback and compliments and suggestions and all that good stuff. Love yins. <3


	5. Close Calls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You took something precious of ours. Time to return the favor."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bunch of awful stuff in this chapter, so be cautious when reading. I debated on whether to put one of these scenes in at all, but decided that it needed to be put in for development. 
> 
> I'm on vacation until next Saturday, so no new chapters for a while.

The duffel bag of supplies actually comes in handy for when you have to redress your wound. Heidi had previously shown Joel how to keep it from getting infected, something you can't say you weren't thankful for.

The two of you take refuge in a gas station to let Joel catch a breath and to let you rest your leg. You had to eventually change into shorts after your jeans had started to inflame your wound, but the problem is that you have no protection for your legs; you can't even count the new scrapes and bug bites and bruises littering your skin.

"You alright, kid?" he asks once he notices you peeking under your bandage.

"Yeah, I'm okay." You huff in annoyance. "It's just really itchy."

"That's good," he replies with a nod. "It means it's healing."

"Well it's annoying."

The both of you should've known that peace doesn't last long. Joel's ears pick up the sound of an engine further down the road, and he quickly pulls you to your feet and drags you into the manager's office before the loud truck pulls up to the building.

You squint against the tears forming in your eyes at the pain running up your thigh, coming from the awkward movement of your leg as you went to get up when he tugged on you.

You watch as Joel shoves a desk up against the door right before the men start raiding the building. Shelves are overturned, glass breaks, and the two of you lean all of your weight against the desk to keep them from getting in.

"Aye, any of you boys check the office?" comes from the voice of a man on the other side of the door. He turns the knob and starts ramming his shoulder against the plywood once he finds out that it's locked.

"Bobby, quit it! You're gonna end up hurting yourself!" another man yells, causing the breath to leave your lungs in a rush of relief.

The man named Bobby gives up on getting in, and Joel clutches onto your arm to ground your shaking body.  
"It's alright. They're almost gone, I think," he whispers, pressing an ear against the door to listen for any sound.  
It isn’t until you hear the truck pull out and speed off that the two of you finally come out of the room. Joel helps you over the fallen aisles that you can't bring your leg to raise up onto just yet.

* * *

That night, Joel teaches you how to redress your wound, hands always so careful and slow in movement, as if you're a one-of-a-kind vase he's worried about breaking.

“Do ya think you really could've stayed behind?” he suddenly asks, mimicking the question you had asked him all those months ago. How long have you been traveling together now? Six, seven months? It's seemed like a lifetime.

You shrug your shoulders as you wrap the gauze around your leg, not too loose and not too tight, you recall him saying.

“No. As good of people as they are, it would feel really weird to not hear you griping all day,” you say, attempting to get him off the subject because even you feel uncomfortable right now with the amount of vulnerability swirling through the air between you two.

“Huh. _Thanks_.”

The conversation ends with many unanswered questions on your part.  
You sleep and dream of experienced hands and warm lips and surprisingly soft skin, and when you wake to a throbbing between your legs so strong that it hurts, you find it impossible not to touch yourself. You’ve held off for so long, and maybe it can help you calm down, ease the pain in your thigh. But Joel’s two feet away keeping watch, yet when you slip a hand under your panties all the worry disappears; you’re hot and swollen and ready for release. It’s been a long time.  
You don't want to involve him, but maybe if you keep him busy he won’t notice or hear what you’re doing.

“Joel,” you whisper, continuing once he hums in attention, “tell me a story.”

“What kind?” His question surprises you, as you thought he would pull some three-second-story bullshit: _once upon a time there was a princess, she died, the end._

“Uhhhh,” you run a hand over your slit, biting back a moan. “A story about a girl and a man as they travel across the country.”

“Sounds familiar,” he says in jest, and you circle a finger over your clit at the deep honey of his voice, Texan accent making his words flow like a waterfall.  
You feel disgusting for doing this to him, but you can't help it; the need between your legs is too strong.

The whole time he speaks, you stroke yourself closer to your peak. A small gasp comes from your throat when you run over a particularly sensitive spot, and you clamp your lips shut, pause your movement.

“Ya alright back there?” he says, thankfully never turning around.

“Yeah. Just got a pain in my thigh.” Your voice is too breathy and high-pitched to pass off as pain.

When you feel his hand on your shoulder you flinch, using that as an excuse to pull your hand from your pants, cringing at the snap of your panty’s waistband against your skin.

“Roll over then.”

You huff in frustration yet roll onto your other side, which does put the pressure off of your leg. He turns back around to scan the woods and you shrivel your nose up at him.

_Should you….?_

You ask him to continue with the story, each syllable dripping off his tongue lighting a raging fire between your legs. You don't know how he doesn't hear the noises of your slick as you slip a finger into yourself, relishing the tight heat. You cover another moan by burying your face into your pack, currently being used as a pillow. You fantasize about the roughness of his hands against your skin and the feel of his chest against your breasts and the surprising softness of his hair on your inner thighs and you're _so close_ —

—when your climax comes, it sweeps you off your feet and carries you through mountains of pleasure and twitching limbs and a clenched-shut jaw. When you come down from your high, you can't help but let out a relieved sigh at the stress being tossed from your shoulders and exhaustion finally blanketing you.

Joel finishes with a _the end_ and that night you don't dream of slit throats or headless children or your brother’s half-eaten corpse laying on the floor, but rather living in a field of barley somewhere with a chameleon soul and all the time in the world.

* * *

Joel insists that you start “physical therapy” to help your muscles heal faster, that it worked for him when he hurt his back working on a house for some old man.

He makes you do these weird stretches that, after a few weeks, actually start to help with the pain and bring back your strength.

As soon as you heal up, however, you’re tossed down a hill by a gang member looking to steal your stuff, resulting in a gash above your eyebrow and you landing in the most foul-smelling hole you've ever encountered. Liquids get all in your mouth and eyes and you gag as flies swarm around your head. You attempt to climb up, back to where Joel is, but the dirt breaks apart under your fingers and you can’t get a good grip. It isn't until your panic finally subsides that you realize what you’re sitting in: a huge circular grave of bodies and blood that the gang dump their victims into. You feel the soft skin and fingers and hair of the dead, and you cry out in disgust. Joel screams your name, and you dig out half the slope before realizing there's no way out without help. The bodies slide under your feet, and you almost slip once the clotted blood on the surface makes contact with the bottom of your shoe.

The next time you _do_ fall, tumbling back onto someone's face, crushing their nose with your elbow and the _crunch_ of the bone breaking makes you cringe.

Joel eventually makes it over to you, and by this point you've bathed in every bodily fluid possible for a few minutes.

Even Joel gags as he offers you his hand. You immediately shed your clothes and throw on the largest man’s shirt as a makeshift dress until you can wash your clothes.

You make it to a river and Joel gives you some privacy to bathe while he sets up camp. You pull pieces of muscle and skin from your hair, wipe the thick, dried blood from your body, wash your clothes against a large rock. Joel comes to bring you a piece of gauze and some medical tape to cover the gash on your forehead, barely looking upon you for a few seconds, even though the water and knees pulled against your chest cover you.

It takes you a few minutes to find the camp Joel set up, but when you do you collapse to the ground and cocoon yourself in your blanket.

“I miss beds. And tubs. And not having to run from infected and murder the living,” you mutter with a reminiscing sigh.

Joel huffs from his place in front of the fire. “You and me both, kid.”

You look over at him. “When was the last time you took a bubble bath?”

He chuckles, says, “Since my honeymoon.”

“So a decade or four?”

Joel furrows his brow and tosses a stick at you. “Hey now, I ain’t that old.” The playfulness in his voice makes you grin.

“I don't call you Pappaw for nothing.”

You move out from under your blanket and, while he has his back turned toward the fire, jump onto him, knocking the both of you over.

He actually laughs as you attempt to wrestle with him, and he allows you to put him in a headlock and give him a quick noogie before returning the favor.

You’re quick on your feet and easily evade him before he can trap you again, and the both of you gasp for breath as the moment settles.

Joel goes back to his normal cold self, ordering you to go to sleep while he keeps watch and _not ask him for another goddamned story_. You blush, suddenly remember what happened during the last story time.

You fucking masturbated to his _voice_.

How sick could you be?

But for now you can’t be sure if you’ll live past the next day, hour, minute, second, so you chase the pleasures in life. All of the ones your brain tells you are wrong but your heart always tends to follow.

“How’s your leg?” he suddenly asks, reaches over to touch the scar and you shiver at his skin against your skin, yet he never moves. Just absentmindedly runs a forefinger back and forth over the healed tissue.

“It’s fine, Joel,” you mutter, looking up at him and when the two of you meet eyes you see something in them that you can’t quite place your finger on and your body releases another shiver, snapping the both of you back to reality. He jerks his hand away as if it had been electrocuted and turns back to the fire.

“I just wish you would stop doing stupid shit. ‘s almost like you’re _trying_ to die.”

You let out a short laugh and nod your head, don’t notice that he sees the motion, squares his jaw and lets out a breath through his nose.

You can't deny how uncomfortable you feel. The way he just looked at you starts to burn coals within your belly, and the anger simmering off of him adds fuel to the fire.

You really need to control yourself. You can't even think about the man without wanting some part of his body on or in you.

To top the shit mountain off, you can't even get away from him to blow off some fucking steam, have some one-on-self girl time, even to get your goddamn thoughts together.

“Joel, don’t you think we both need a break from each –“

“No.” He doesn't even skip a beat in answering your question, doesn’t look at you. “When I ain’t with you bad stuff happens, so don't even finish that sentence, (Name).”

“Joel, I can’t even take a piss without you right next to me! Jesus, sometimes people need a fucking break from each other.”

“You’re goddamn impossible,” he mutters with a shake of his head.

You sit up, point an accusing finger at him once he looks over at you. “I don't think it has anything to do with me. It’s that _you_ don’t wanna be alone!”

His brow furrows and a furious gaze darkens his eyes. “If I ain’t with you who’s gonna keep you from making stupid ass decisions?”

“I can make my own –“

“- you have _no_ idea what it’s been like out there, (Name).”

You let out a breath, can’t think up a retort because you agree with him. Your parents and then your brother ruined you. You’re too soft-hearted, wear your heart on your sleeve like a beacon to anybody that wants an easy target.

“This conversation is over. Go to bed,” he mutters, snuffs out the fire and leaves the area in a darkness so smothering you think you’ll suffocate.

* * *

You start to get scared once the thoughts come back. Every time you and Joel argue - which seems to be an hourly occurrence - or every time you have to kill or every time you’re almost bitten, they come back.

_This is what it’s gonna be like for the rest of your life. Do you really think you can suffer for so long? Why not choose when and how you die? Nobody would miss you. You’re a nuisance, useless cargo for Joel to have to haul around._

Your thoughts always drift back to him.

 _Always_.

By the end of the month, you’re tired of arguing back every time he reprimands you for doing something he deems stupid. You just let him yell at you, and he notices.

“What the hell’s been going on with you lately?” he asks as you meet back up with each other.

The plank you had used to cross the dam had broken while Joel was on it, so you had to bust open the office window to get to the drawbridge controls and help him across.

He’s soaked from head to toe, and you would’ve laughed if you weren’t so exhausted.

“Let’s get a move on.” You’re turning the tables on him, now evading questions he’s dying to know.

He can’t know, you won’t let him know. Nobody can know what you’re thinking.  
But Joel knows the game you’re playing – he’s been playing it this whole time.

* * *

You wanted some time away from Joel, but not like this. Bandits stumble upon your camp in the middle of the night and rip you from your bed. Joel tries to get them to let you go, tries to fight them off.

Everything happens in slow motion. He screams your name, reaches for you as they hold him back. Your fingertips brush his before they yank you away, knock the breath from you as your back hits the ground. They tie your hands together and throw you over the back of a horse.

You hear a man taunt Joel, hear his grunt of pain when the bandit hits him in the face with the butt of his gun.

“You took something precious of ours. Time to return the favor."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh god I hope this is ok. I was really iffy about the whole Reader rubbing one out to Joel without him knowing but, come on, it was leading up to this for a while. After spending almost a year in constant sexual frustration and it coming to a head, there wasn't really any other option tbh.


	6. Curiosity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Your curiosity is finally sated, and they aren't the answers you wanted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was a heartbreaking one to write and will be a tough one to read: it contains rape and suicidal thoughts. Proceed with caution.

You wake up with a cloud of danger looming overhead. The creak of your shoulders as you attempt to sit up sends pain shooting through your numb arms.  

You don't know where you are.  

People come in, flood light into the room, ask you where their stuff is. You tell them you don't know. They threaten to torture you.  

"What did you do with Joel?" you ask, and they laugh at you.  

"That grandpa you've been traveling with? He's fine." He waves you off with a hand, crouches down in front of you. "We ain't got much time before he finds us, though, so you'd better hurry up and start remembering before it gets ugly." 

Your blood runs cold at the promise of danger in his voice.  

"What did we take that was so important?" 

He yanks you up by your arm, drags you over to a chair and throws you into the seat.  

"Grandpa would know," he says, "I think I'll just keep you until he shows up. Easier to kill the both of you."  

At this point you're so used to your life being threatened that you just let out a dejected sigh. Death is welcomed.  

"Just fucking kill me," you mutter, being both serious and joking at the same time.  

He tells you that he can't kill you yet. You want to sob.  

You're too exhausted to look for a way out, instead looking for ways you could just _end it all_ and be done with this. Heidi would be disappointed.  

When he hits you and gashes open your cheek, you wince. When he causes blood to flood your mouth, you wince. When he hits your stomach as hard as he can, you throw up. 

* * *

You kill them after a day or two of being held there, not sure how you do it with your condition, but the man dragging you from the chair and attempting to strip you forces your fight-or-flight response. Fight is the only option.  

Joel finds you and gives the leader her treasured box of memories from deceased family members, the one that was buried under supplies in the duffle bag. She lets the two of you go, says she won't send her gang after the two of you again.  

The first thing you notice when all has calmed and the two of you have gone on your way is the large gash across the upper bridge of his nose. He notices you staring and ruffles your bloodied hair.  

"I'm alright, kid," he says, lays a hand on the back of your neck. When he strokes your pulse with a thumb and squeezes, you have to hold back a shiver. You can't help the fire starting in your belly. 

* * *

You mess up and lose your virginity to a cute boy you met just a few days ago in a settlement you and Joel are passing through. You're too curious, always too curious, and when he pulls you into a broom closet and kisses you, after quite a bit of coaxing and days of longing glances and sweet words, you can't say no. Even when you want to so badly because it feels so fucking wrong.  

When he forces himself into you, it hurts. He sighs against your cheek and his bare face disgusts you. His hands fumble under your shirt and grope painfully at your breasts. _Joel's_ hands wouldn't fumble. They would play you like the stringed guitar you caught him strumming that one time, the only thing on your mind in that moment being how dexterous his fingers most definitely are.  

The boy gives you compliments, tells you how good your tits feel under his hands, how pretty you are—how you shouldn't leave with that old man because you're too much of a pretty peach to be wasted. _You need to be eaten while you're still ripe and ready_. Your face, screwed up in pain, suddenly screws up in anger, and you try to push him away. He's stronger than you thought. He raises your hands above your head on the wall and takes you, every essence of your innocence and fighting spirit and femininity with each thrust, a hand pressed against your mouth to stop the protests coming from your lips, ignoring your pleas and tears and _stop it hurts!_  

You bleed, blood and semen running down your legs when he pulls out and leaves you in the closet alone. You can't tell if that's a good thing or a bad thing.  

 _The bleeding won't stop_. You stuff your panties full of cloth for the next hour, yet nothing will make it stop. It hurts. You don't know what to do. 

When you go to Joel and start asking him to leave ASAP, he knows something's wrong. Of course he does. The look he gives you is one of experience and knowing and suddenly you aren't curious about boys' hands on you anymore.  

Your curiosity is finally sated, and they aren't the answers you wanted.  

You quickly pack up, relieved at Joel's agreement to your request. The boy forces himself upon you one last time under the guise of a one-armed hug.  

"I'll miss you," he grumbles mockingly, patting you roughly on the shoulder before Joel calls to you, allowing you an excuse to get away from him.  

You want to cry. You want to lay down and let Mother Nature have her way with you because this world is too harsh for your liking and you're too soft-spirited, only surviving thus far because of the man with a protective arm wrapped around the line of your shoulders. He gives you a semblance of comfort—he's your shield, your sword, your companion that will do anything to protect you, because it's just how it is with him. You're under his watch, and you think sourly that he treats you exactly like a father would a daughter, and it isn't until you finally make it to the lake that you can breathe again.  

The both of you take a break, simply gazing out at the beautiful water and the world torn asunder around it.  

"Why you bleeding?" The muted venom in his voice makes you flinch. It isn’t directed towards you, and for some reason that makes you even more terrified. 

"What do you mean?" you mutter, subconsciously rubbing your thighs together to feel the blood and semen cold against your skin, sticky and you almost gag at the thought of it.  

He places a hand on the back of your neck and you close your eyes, finding comfort in the roughness and callouses and fuck he's experienced. He wouldn't hurt you. And despite your thoughts about sex with boys, you're still curious about what it would be like with him. He's a _man_ , who's felt attraction and love and happiness, and you want nothing else in this world than to give him all of that and more. And he's _Joel_ , the person would kill anybody that tried to hurt you, who could never hurt you, who _would_ never hurt you.

"I knew that boy was up to something. He eyed you like a piece of goddamn meat." His thumb slides up and down the pulse of your neck and you shiver. "We shoulda left sooner." 

"Do girls usually... bleed the first time?" Even while trying your hardest to stop it, your voice still breaks.  

At that moment you feel like a little girl under the pitying gaze of a man who knew she'd been taken advantage of.  

He evades your question with an insult. "Next time you'll know not to trust boys." 

It's a slap in the face and arousing at the same time. He fucking mocked you, yet he said boys.  

Joel definitely isn't a boy.  

"Go on and get cleaned up." His hand lowers back down to his side, and the hairs on the back of your neck stand up when the cold wind meets your ghostly warm skin. "I'll try and get the blood out of your clothes." 

You feel ashamed, both disgusted and disgusting, so fucking humiliated that you want to tie a rock to your foot and jump into the lake.  

"I'm sorry," you say. You don't know what you're sorry for.  

When you wash the blood and sweat and semen off of your skin, you sob. It feels like a part of you had been left inside a boy's clenched fist and persistent mouth. When you clean the semen out of you, you growl in both anger and pain.  

The cold water clings to your skin and makes you shiver as you stand on the lake's bank, watching as Joel hangs your jeans and underwear over a tree branch to dry. You’re too numb to feel embarrassed about your nakedness, about the fact that he can see every imperfection and every scar and every freckle. 

But he doesn’t bat an eye at your nakedness. When he sees you standing there he immediately fetches your tattered blanket from your pack before draping it over your shoulders. There's a moment where, as he stands in front of you and pulls the sheet together to hide your nudity, you see a softness in his eyes... before it's gone again.  

"We'll set up here to let you rest before we start scavenging tomorrow." 

He doesn't hear you thank him as he walks away, collecting your bags to venture further into the brush to find a good camping spot. Look at him, always thinking ahead. The lake is too dangerous to relax next to, as gorgeous as it is. Some cover is needed. But of course he'd already thought of that.  

Your bleeding's already stopped. 

* * *

It isn't until you're back on the road again and riding in a truck that you're finally able to talk about it.  

"He called me a _ripe peach_ , ya know." 

You expect Joel to answer, tell you that he's too tired to talk about it or say something sarcastic or make fun of you, but none of it ever comes. He stares at the road and says nothing, silently offering you a set of ears that'll finally listen to what you have to say. 

"I don't think you know how disgusting I feel..." You press a hand to your forehead, wiping away the cold sweat gathering there. "In a way I feel like it's my fault. I let him coax me into doing it because I'm young and always so _fucking_ curious and he saw that in me." You take a breath and survey the land passing by the truck. "You were right, Joel. I always let my feelings get in the way of my safety."  

He lays a comforting hand on your shoulder as you cry.  

* * *

He watches over you more after the incident, hardly ever leaving you by yourself, taking more time for his watches to allow you extra sleep, shielding you from every danger like an umbrella shields a girl's nice hair from the rain.  

You wish he would just talk to you, because as the weeks and months go by you can see his eyes darkening, wrinkles starting to form, grey starting to pepper his dark hair and beard. He's still carrying his burdens under yours. The more you share, the more he gets weighed down.  

You eventually stop sharing, and eventually he starts opening up. Small things, like what life was like for him before the outbreak, but that doesn't matter. The fondness in his eyes when he reminisces about simpler times makes you want to build a time machine so you can take him back. The thought makes you sour. You can't get attached to this man more than you already have, especially not romantically. No matter how curious he makes you that's one line you can't cross. Besides, he wouldn't let you if you tried.  

* * *

It takes you two almost a year before he finally gets to the point to where he can tell you the real reason why he let you stick with him all these months. 

This time you're the one driving to give him some sleep when you see him reach forward to turn on the radio, a Johnny Cash cassette tape left in the cup holder your only source of entertainment for the few days you're on the road.  

You can feel his eyes on your face, burning a hole through your temple.  

"You alright there?" you ask teasingly, glancing over at him from the corner of your eye.  

The quiet _no_ he gives you shocks you to no end. He's finally gonna start talking about it.  

You don't realize he's upset until his voice starts cracking as he speaks to you, but he’s too stubborn to cry. "I keep havin' this dream where me and Tommy find your brother, just like before, but this time you're the one being ripped open. And I-I know it's you but it's _her_ face. It's killing me..." He trails off with a deep sigh then reaches forward to double the music volume to distract both of you from his display of vulnerability.  

You sing along to the chorus of 'Ring of Fire' as you keep your eyes peeled on the road, occupying your tongue to keep from asking who she is. It's enough for you, the fact that he trusts you enough at this point to tell you his nightmares blows your mind as is. You don't wanna push your boundaries. Don't wanna even speak to him in fear of him shutting you out again.  

"You remind me of her, ya know." You almost don't hear his confession over the blast of the music. "I was selfish, and I acted before I could think because I let my feelings get the best of me, and now we're stuck and every time I see you I'm reminded that they’re gone." 

You white-knuckle the steering wheel and glance over at him. He looks worse than he has in a long while, so tired and hopeless and it kills you that you can't do anything to fix it, especially when he's done so much for you. Put up with you for this long.  

"I appreciate you telling me," you say, reaching over to turn the music down until it's a background comfort. "I don't know who she or they are and frankly it's none of my business, but I'm sorry about whatever happened to her... Thanks for keeping me around this long, though, especially considering the circumstances." 

He stretches out his legs as far as he can inside the small cab and props his elbow up against the arm rest on the door.  

"I knew what I was getting into as soon as I saw you. This ain't nobody's fault but my own," he mutters with a sigh, sounding utterly dejected.  

"Now I understand why you were always so mean to me," you say, pulling off the highway and onto the gravel. "Come on, let's blow off some steam." 

"We ain't got time," he groans, reluctantly following you out of the car.  

"Right now we got a cassette tape and all the time in the world, Cowboy!"  

"Really wish you would stop callin' me that." 

"Isn't that what they do down in Texas?" 

He gives a short laugh. "Do people actually wear shoes in Kentucky?" 

You give him a pointed look then raise your brows at the teasing grin on his lips before reaching inside the glove box to peruse through the—holy shit—various cassette tapes on display. You weren't expecting there to be anything actually in here. He watches you from outside the truck while leaning his forearm against the door frame.  

"Touché," you mutter, pulling out a Bruce Springsteen cassette. "This dude had an eclectic taste in music."  

You pop the tape in, turn the volume up all the way, and let the first track start to play.  

As soon as the first few parts of the melody start playing, Joel groans, moving around to lean against the hood of the car.  

"This song? Really?"  

"I thought it was fitting!" you call to him, dancing around and kicking up dust as the first verse continues on to the chorus. "Come on, Joel, 'Born in the U.S.A.' is a classic!"  

"If we get eaten, it's your fault!" You can hear his amused laughter over the music.  

You jog over to him and grab onto his hands to pull him away from the car.  

"(Name), not now," he says, still allowing you to pull him away.  

The next song starts playing and you circle around him, keeping a hand on his upper body the whole time.  

"You done?" he asks, and you can see the amusement in his eyes.  

"Not until you dance with me," you retort, lightly pushing him.  

"I ain't doing that." 

"Twirl me, at least." 

He reluctantly takes your hand in his and you spin in his grip, unable to contain your elated laughter. Right now you feel as if time has stopped, marveling at the laughter crinkling his eyes, and you want to stay in this moment forever, committing his expression to memory. It breaks your heart that he can only find happiness in short bursts before the memories of his past begin to plague him yet again.  

Joel presses a hand against your lower back and allows you to place your feet on the top of his boots before he turns the both of you to the beat of the music.  

Surprisingly, you aren’t afraid, because his hands aren’t soft like the boy’s and his face is grizzled rather than bare and he’s _Joel_.  

You jump away, then shriek gleefully when he pulls you back to him to dip you, perfectly timed as the song fades out.  

The both of you are breathing heavily, and suddenly the moment is over.  Joel walks back to the car and hopping into the driver's seat before turning the radio off altogether.  

"Come on, (Name). We'd better get going." 

You dejectedly sigh and shuffle yourself toward the truck and climb into the passenger seat.

"You'd better rest up before it hits nightfall," he mutters, pulling back on to the road.  

The moment is suddenly over, and what follows is a terribly awkward silence. You eventually fall asleep under the rumble of the engine. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm finally home from vacation and stoned as fuck right now and I've been really sad because my grandmother got awful pneumonia from her surgery and my great uncle died and I was in Wisconsin and wasn't able to be there for the funeral and my best friend got evicted from her house and life isn't good right now. 
> 
> But this story is making me feel bittersweet. I'm hoping that I can get out of this funk by writing, now that I'm finally able to AND I'M SO EXCITED ABOUT IT. I just have a lot of feelings, ok?
> 
> Give me feedback, questions, suggestions, love, all that stuff. I'm going to bed. Love u <3


	7. Revelations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joel levels a solemn gaze at you. "Stuff's changed, hasn't it?"
> 
> "Yeah. Afraid so."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I found a video today in which two twelve-year-old girls rap about feminism. They looked so much like Ellie and Riley it was both hilarious and terrifying.
> 
> Also this chapter made me sob on multiple occasions??????? There are so many things going on and emotions and I feel like Joel would be more open right now than ten, fifteen years down the line
> 
> edit: OK SO APPARENTLY AO3 COMPLETELY FUCKED UP THE FORMAT AND SAVED ALL THE TIMES I HAD TO COPY THE STORY CAUSE I THOUGHT I LOST ALL MY PROGRESS WHEN THE POWER WENT OUT BUT APPARENTLY NOT IM JUST RLLY EMBARRASSED

Joel feels better. It's in the way he speaks, _what_ he speaks about. He smiles more, or rather, he actually smiles.

It's electric when he touches you, and you're starting to think that he feels it, too. 

Ten months in, he tells you about her. 

"Sarah was her name." 

You glance over at him from the driver's seat—always in a truck for Sharing Time—and watch him study the road ahead of you. 

"The person you lost? Who I remind you of?" 

He simply shakes his head. "No. Sarah was..." he clears his throat, "she was my daughter." 

" _Was_." 

"Yeah, she was, uh... shot the night all this started." 

You start to cry because he has a _dead daughter_ and you've been so selfish this whole time to not realize that he must've lost someone that meant more than life to him, that he was a mean person so he didn't have to cope, because everyone knows that there's no time for coping.

"If you're gonna start crying pull over so I can drive," he huffs.  

"Joel, how can you—" you scoff at him, "your daughter died and you're brushing it off like it's nothing!" 

"It's the only thing keeping me sane, (Name). The more I think about it, the worse off I am." 

You suddenly stop the car and turn off the engine, stuffing the keys into your back pocket. 

"Alright. Listen. I've sat here for almost a year watching you suffer and mope around and I didn't know what the problem was. But now that I do, I'm gonna help you. And we aren't leaving here until we figure some stuff out." 

He reaches out to you, likely for the keys, and the subdued anger on his face makes you almost back out of your plan, but you don't. 

"Gimme the damn keys. You're gonna get us killed." 

You laugh sourly at him. "Keep going on like this and you're gonna end up killing _yourself_." 

He bares his teeth at you. "Really? And what do you know about that?" 

"Because I've tried!" Time stops, and he falls silent. You blink away tears and take his hand in yours. The roughness of his skin feels weird against your own, untouched and still soft and maybe it's a good representation of how the world has shaped the both of you. "I don't want you to end up like that." 

"I won't, (Name)." 

"Promise?" 

"Promise." 

* * *

You don't know fear until Joel is stabbed by a lone hunter, the rest of her group dead by your hands, whom she soon follows. You give her no mercy, stopping once her head is bashed in and you can't even tell where her face is supposed to be because all of her features are smashed to bits and the blood coats you like a second skin and you're so fucking furious that you can't help yourself, then you think about Joel dying not two feet away and you stop, go over to him. The woman is taking the only person you have away from you.  

The blood is everywhere, all over your legs and your hands look as if you have on red gloves. The smell is overwhelming and your stomach begins to churn. Joel doesn't try to get up, doesn't speak. Just screws up his face in pain and reaches for the hand you have pressed under his ribs to stop the bleeding.  

"Joel, please! Don't do this to me," you cry, sifting through your pack to find a newly-looted medical kit. "Just hang on, okay?" 

Gauze. You find gauze. How to stop the bleeding, he'll get mad at you for wasting supplies if they just get ruined from his blood, you're so scared. 

"Hillbilly." You look over at him through your sobs and watch as he reaches a hand toward your face, touches a bloody finger to your cheek. "'s alright." 

You do something you shouldn't. Something you really really shouldn't but if you don't do it now and he ends up dying you'll never forgive yourself. 

His lips are chapped and his beard hurts the soft skin of your face but goddamn if it isn't the best thing that's ever happened to you. But _he's_ the best thing that's ever happened to you so you guess it makes sense. And you could lose him.

Just when everything started getting better, the world has a way of fucking it up. 

You get the bleeding to eventually stop, but Joel is in no position to move. You're able to drag him behind the counter in the convenience store you're in and make him as comfortable as possible before you curl up next to him, put a hand to his chest to feel the steady beat of his heart. He's still alive. You have to keep him alive because he's the only thing that's kept you alive and he deserves nothing more than to have the favor returned.  

Your tears haven't stopped, they won't stop as much as you try to keep them down. 

"Joel, I'm so scared," you whisper to him, feel his hand on yours, the one over his heart, and he faintly squeezes. "I really don't want you to die. I need you." 

"I won't." 

"Promise?" 

"Promise." 

* * *

The guilt and embarrassment that you feel over kissing him is unbearable. It's smothering you. He doesn't say anything about it, doesn't say much at all for the next few weeks until the two of you are standing on a building, watching the sun set behind an auto shop with a scar on your thigh from a knife and a puncture in his chest from a knife, and you almost laugh if it weren't so sad that a fleeting thought passes through your mind of how these experiences have shaped your relationship. It isn't until one of you is in danger that the other pulls back the curtain and lets you see their true colors. 

"I watched you butcher that woman," he says.  

"We were in danger." 

"It was overkill." 

"I made sure she didn't come back." 

"You kissed me." 

He says it so casually, as if you're talking about the weather or what you're gonna eat for dinner. Not a potential reason for him to leave you. 

"I thought you were dying, Joel." You can't meet his eyes, won't meet them, because you're so afraid of the disgust you'll find there that it sickens you just thinking about it. "I'm sorry. There were so many emotions and I got caught up in the moment and—" 

He cuts you off with a hand pressed to your mouth before he cradles your cheeks in his palms, pressing hard enough to leave prints behind, you're sure. 

"(Name). Listen to me. We both know how this is gonna end. We're already in too deep as it is." 

Your blood begins to boil, and the bite in your voice comes back. "If you feel absolutely nothing for me, then tell me. So I can stop with the wishful thinking." 

He lowers his hands and turns back to the sinking sun. "That's the goddamn problem... I can't." 

There’s a long silence, awkward and pregnant and you can't stand the _silence_ anymore, never could.  

“Who do I remind you of?” 

He doesn't answer for a few seconds, and when he does your mouth falls open. “My ex-wife.” 

“Wh—“ 

“You’re stubborn as hell, (Name). Too soft-hearted..." Joel sighs. "But in a way you ain’t nothing like her.” 

“Oh. Not sure how I feel about—“ 

“I kinda miss her sometimes.”  

“I-I’m sorry, Joel.” 

He shrugs his shoulders and heads toward the ladder leading to the ground. You don't know what to do. You're so fucking confused because this is the first time he’s ever been so open and honest about what’s eating at him, about your relationship. Even more than when he told you about his dream.  

Both of you have crossed a line you never thought possible, never thought he would cross since _he_ was the one that created it in the first place.  

You're in too deep.  

* * *

Joel meets one of his friends— _acquaintances_ , he corrects—that he confesses used to be part of the gang he was in. He’s a slimy fucker, ogling you like a piece of chocolate when he doesn’t think you’re looking and giving Joel venomous glares behind his back. But you see.  

When you ask Joel why you’re staying in a warehouse with this guy, he tells you that the man, Bobby, is the only one he can think of who knows where Tommy is. You had almost forgotten there was a task behind all this travelling. 

When Bobby first calls you a sweet little peach, you lunge at him, don't want his grimy hands or his mouth on your already-bruised and broken skin. You spend the next three hours under the stairwell leading up to the second floor. You hear them talking about you, Bobby asking him _what the fuck is wrong with her_. Joel tells him to back off. 

Joel comforts you. Doesn't touch you or speak to you. But he sits with you, not even within arm’s reach, until you can breathe again. Offers you a granola bar and some water and a book and still doesn't speak.  

The next morning you wake up to shouting, screeching, glass breaking. Joel is nowhere to be found, so you try the office. Bobby lay there, face shredded from glass shards still poking from his skin and his arm bent the wrong way, crisp white bone sticking out. You back away from the growing puddle of blood on the floor as Bobby pleads with you to _don't let him_ _kill_ _me!_  

“(Name)! Get the fuck out.”  

You whip your head around at the sound of Joel’s voice to find him walking towards you, rope in hand. When he grabs you by the arm and attempts to drag you from the room, you shake him off.  

“Joel, what the fuck are you doing?” you ask, can only watch as he lifts Bobby into a chair and begins wrapping the rope around his upper body and loops it around his legs.  

“I told you to get out. You don't need to see this.” 

Bobby laughs, splattering blood on his lips and chin. “Let the peach stay. Show her the monster you really are!” 

“ _Out! Now!_ ” You’ve never heard Joel sound so desperate and pleading, and you can only stagger back, tripping out the door and down to the first floor.  

What the fuck is he doing? Torturing him? Killing him? _Let the peach stay_ _,_ your brain screams at you, and suddenly the screams upstairs don't bother you as much.  

When Joel finds you he’s covered in blood, as if someone’s dipped a brush in red paint and splattered him with it.  

“What happened?” you whisper, standing from the barrel you’re sitting on.  

“Just had to take care of some stuff, that’s all. Tommy’s in Boston’s quarantine zone.”  

You follow after him, finding it difficult to keep up with his jogging pace as he rushes into the forest, turning around every so often to make sure you’re still here. What in the hell is he running from?  

When the two of you make it to a stream, Joel allows you to catch your breath as he gathers some water to sterilize and drink.  

“What in the fuck were we running from?” 

“Apparently Bobby’s still in his little gang. They were supposed to come back from a hunt today.” He turns back to look at you, and the sheer determination in his eyes makes you shiver. “I had to get us outta there.”  

* * *

Now that you have a set destination, you feel trapped, as if you’re in a fixed story that allows no freedom for exploration or adventure, you aren’t nomads drifting wherever the wind takes you or a fish following the stream. And you're sad, real sad, because you know that Joel will hand you over to Tommy and everything with him will be finished. He’ll make sure of it. 

“I have one question,” you say, and Joel hums to let you know he’s listening. “How in the shitting _fuck_ are we gonna make it from Wyoming to Massachussets?” 

He huffs at you. “I don't fucking know. We just gotta pick up the pace, make very little stops, and get a car and a bunch’a gas. We should be there within a month if we can find a car to last us.” 

* * *

No matter what Joel says, he doesn’t seem to be in too much of a hurry to make it to his brother. A month passes, and your pace slows to a stop. You set up base at what looks to be a small, old jail, but with its concrete walls and barbed fences, it's the safest thing you've come across thus far.

"So, how long we staying here?"

You block off the door leading to Solitary Confinement, where all the bodies you've both found and killed are.

He sighs, fans the front of his shirt to cool off against the stifling, stale heat.

"Dunno. But it's better'n nothing."

"Which is what we've always had," you mutter, lifting yourself onto the nearest plastic visiting table.

* * *

For the next day or so, you make the jail as homey as possible. When you attempt to call a cell to sleep in, Joel suggests that the both of you sleep in the same room. The idea both calms and intimidates you because he'll be so close, but the problem lies in the fact that he'll be  so close.

When the two of you lay down to sleep, you on the top bunk and Joel on the bottom, the humidity inside the room forces you to shed your sweat-soaked shorts, yet you force yourself to leave your tank top on. The thin blanket resting over your lower half is the only thing covering your nudity.

You don't expect to be waken up by your own sobs and the warmness of hands on you. There's a throbbing in the back of your head and you're so dizzy you might puke.

Someone lay you onto a bed and sits on the edge until your sobs dissipate, until you can get your bearings and fucking breathe again.

When someone touches the back of your head, you whimper when a sharp pain slices through your skull.

"Don't think about moving, kid. I'll be right back." You know that voice, all Texas and liquid copper and it sounds like home to you.

Joel.

The bed ebbs with each movement of your companion, and when you're finally able to open your eyes, you see nothing but darkness. There's a shadow against the wall you're facing, from a flashlight Joel's using to sift through the noisy contents of his bag.

"Joel," you say, not necessarily calling for him. You just like the sound of it. Despite your intentions, he hums in attention anyway, and you realize you have to say something to him. "What happened?"

"You had a nightmare and rolled off the damn bed. Hit your head real hard on the floor."

"What're ya looking for?" You almost can't will yourself to speak against the pain fanning out over the entirety of your cranium.

"I don't fucking know," he hisses after a long second, huffs in frustration, and shuts the flashlight off.

The next day, Joel moves another bed into the room and scoots it against the existing bunk bed.

A rock settles in the pit of your stomach.

"You want us to sleep together."

He gives you a Joel-esque look that says  _ really, dumbass?  _ before rolling his eyes and explaining the sleeping situation to you.

"Since you wanna go and roll off stuff, you take the inside bed and I'll take the outside." He gives you a more leery look this time. "Makes it easier to watch you, too."

* * *

Okay, so, the whole sleeping together idea? Not one of Joel's best. Maybe for him, but you're so uncomfortable you would currently rather be fucked in the stomach with a pair of scissors.

He's a cuddler. He takes up too much space and mutters things under his breath and always wants to dig his face into the crook of your neck and if he rubs his warm warm warm hand against your side one more time you're going to  break your own fucking neck.

You have to wake him up on multiple occassions throughout the night when he crosses a line of intimacy that you aren't prepared for, like when he slips a leg between your thighs or manages to slide a hand against the freshly-bared skin of your belly. He always scoots back over to his mattress yet always manages to end up snuggled against your back over and over again.

You aren't sure how to react, because he's been more intimate with you in six hours of sleep than he has in the whole year you've known him. He's dreaming, of what you don't want to know, but you're sure that he doesn't realize you're you. It's extremely confusing and you grow so uncomfortable with how out of character this is that you have to physically push him away from you for the first time tonight.

"Joel, fuck off!" you hiss, cowering even closer to the wall you're next to as he starts to wake up.

"(Name), I didn't do nothing!"

You want to punch him, kick him, kiss him, all three. You just know that you're angry and turned on and you hate both him and yourself for the outcome.

"Just stay on you're fucking side, Joel!"

He scoffs, mutters  _crazy girl _ under his breath before moving over to his mattress.

He doesn't bother you for the rest of the night, giving you a chance to take care of the incessant throbbing between your legs that his actions have created.

* * *

The tension between the two of you quickly escalates within the next month, and you're so afraid that the conflict will peak and shit will hit the fan before you're ready.

You can't talk to each other normally, instead resort to snapping or screaming or throwing random insults like grenades on a battlefield. Something is obviously wrong, yet the both of you are too stubborn to both admit it and ask the other what's on their mind.

You become so cruel and bitter that you resort to telling him you hate him. He pauses mid-insult and stares at you in disbelief, hurt clear and evident for the first time in his eyes.

"I didn't mean that," you whisper. "I'm sorry, I—"

He holds a hand up to shush you. "We can't keep going like this."

"No. We can't."

There's a solemnity in his eyes. "Stuff's changed, hasn't it?"

You reluctantly nod your head, mutter, "Yeah. Afraid so."

He closes his eyes, rests unsteady hands on worn hips and lowers his head. "Then we gotta fix it."

"Got any ideas?"

He shrugs his shoulders to signal that he, in fact, doesn't.

You fold your arms across your chest. "How about we actually talk about our feelings?"

"No. We ain't doing that." If it weren't for you standing in the doorway, he would've walked away.

You very very rarely touch him, so when you do, he knows you mean business. When you fist his button-up to get his attention, you can see the contemplation in his eyes. He wants to shake you off, would love to be able to knock some sense into you, and even _you_ know that you're guaranteeing a morbid fate for yourself by pushing the conversation (if he says he despises you you'll die, and if he ends up having feelings for you you'll end up dying trying to protect him), by forcing him to open up about how he feels about you when he obviously doesn't want to, but that's the problem with him now.

"So we're gonna go on with these chips on our shoulders and keep acting like things aren't weird?" 

"It's worked for me up until now," he says with a sigh, attempting to step around you, but you block him with the smallness of your body.

An amusing thought comes to mind: Joel could easily toss you aside and be on his way, but it's almost as if he wants to tell you what's wrong. He just can't.

A pause stretches between you, awkward and needed to allow the both of you to sort out cluttered thoughts. When you speak you tell him you never want him to die, that you appreciate him, that you couldn't have survived without him. _You think you love him._ It hovers on the tip of your tongue, yet you won't allow yourself to ever say the 'L' word. It's a death sentence no more than the infected or the murderous humans running about.

He doesn't say anything for over a minute, contemplating his next move like the two of you are playing a game and whoever says they like each other first is the loser.

"Ditto," Joel says, calm and nonchalant like always and you allow him to pass you and exit the room, your stomach full of cinder blocks and heart twisted into knots at your revelation.

_ You think you love him. _

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope I did well cause if it were me they would've banged like six chapters ago but I'm a sucker for slow burns
> 
> Leave comments, critiques, suggestions, all that jazz. <3


	8. Confessions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "It's us against the world," Joel tells you, "and that's how it's gonna stay."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so I have a feeling you guys are gonna be very happy with this chapter, as I was very happy writing it. I feel like a huge WEIGHT has been lifted off my shoulders.
> 
> Warning for sexual content

"Peaches."

You freeze, look over at Joel in the driver's seat of a truck the two of you have been traveling in for the past few months.

"What?"

He points off to the side, at a patch of land that used to be a farm, now overgrown with vegetation. "There're some peach trees over there."

Your stomach churns, and you think for a second that you should just fling yourself out of the car to save yourself from the humiliation. "I can't... eat  _ peaches_, Joel." 

He doesn't hesitate in reaching over and resting a hand atop your shoulder, lightly squeezing in an effort to comfort you. When he pulls off the road and fully faces you, you swear your face will burst into flames from embarrassment and fear.

"(Name), listen to me. This is all we got to eat for another few days, and I ain't gonna let you starve yourself." He pats your thigh, says  _come on_ in the most Southern way imaginable, then gets out of the truck. Sometimes you think he's faking the extent of his accent for comedic purposes before you realize one thing: Joel doesn't crack jokes.

Just the fucking smell of them makes you gag, and you can't breathe with the cute boy's fingers around your neck—

—it's Joel's fingers around your neck, the nape, not even fingers anymore, just a hand pressed gently, yet you still want to recoil from his touch.

"They're pretty ripe right now, aren't they?"

_ Ripe little peach. Wouldn't want all this juice wasted on that old man— _

You're finally able to breathe when he parts from you, starts tugging peaches from trees and putting them in his bag like how he plucked your heart from your chest and put it in his pocket or how the cute boy plucked your will from inside your soul and hid it in a clenched fist—

"—anna help out a little?"

You don't even know what he says, simply shake your head because no you don't wanna help out at all or move at all or suddenly live at all and you don't even realize you're crying until Joel speaks up.

"Are you seriously crying right now?"

The exasperation in his voice makes you amble backwards. You don't want him to be disappointed in you. Even more than you are of yourself.

You bury your face into the crook of your elbow so he can't see your expression or tears. "I'm sorry, okay? I don't know what's wrong with me."

You don't expect him to walk over and pull you to his chest, fist a hand in your hair.

"'s alright. Ain't nothing to be ashamed of. Just a bad experience you gotta cope with."

You fist shaking hands into the back of his button-up, focus on his scent to drown out the ripe peaches crowding around you and stuffing themselves into every crevice of your mind.

He doesn't hear you whisper an  _I'm sorry_.  Doesn't know that you wish every day that it was him you had given yourself to. Doesn't know that you have these wild impulses to off yourself on a daily basis.

"It wasn't your fault," he says nonchalantly, suddenly backing away as if your skin is on fire. You'll never understand how he can sound so calm about shit like this.

"That's where you're wrong."

"(Name), I ain't ever wrong."

* * *

Watching him eat a peach is an experience that leaves you ready to fling yourself out of the truck so you can get a moment's peace.

He slowly bites into it, laves his tongue over the teeth marks to catch any juice left behind. You can't force yourself to look away, can only wonder about how he's eaten peaches before, if he'll still eat peaches just as good now that he's been out of practice for a few years.

_ (Name), it's like riding a bike. Once you learn you never forget how to do it. _

Your inner dialogue makes you choke on your own spit, and you know you should shut up but your mind doesn't react before you can ask the most embarrassing question.

"Do you like peaches?"

You don't miss the smile on his face, a rare type that shows he's feeling good enough to jest with you.

"More than most, I imagine."

The dark look he gives you and double meaning behind his words make you squirm in your seat.

* * *

When you make it back to the jail, you notice that the tension has switched tones. It's more sexual than before, electric, makes gooseflesh pepper your skin when he looks at you.

For a moment you think that you liked it better when you were screaming each other's heads off. You feel as if you're in a game of cat and mouse now, always trying to avoid Joel for as long as possible in fear of being swallowed whole by him.

He never allows either of you to sleep by yourselves, telling you that it's harder to fight off both of you than just one if anything were to happen.

He grows stoic again, always appearing as if he had been struck by a wave of happy amnesia that gets rid of any jokes he might've shared with you or good memories the two of you have had.

He gets angry one night when you sneak and eat an extra granola bar because you're still so hungry that you have a roaring migraine. You're perfectly content with simply arguing until he squeezes your upper arm so hard that you cry out in pain.

"Joel, let me the fuck go!"

You try and try and try to pry and twist andyank your arm loose but nothing works because he's too strong.

"(Name), how long is it gonna take you to learn that you can't keep doing shit like this?"

"Joel, I'm so hungry I'm sick."

He releases your arm, turns his back to you and says, "That ain't my problem, now is it?"

You don't know where the courage or the strength comes from, but you push him, start screaming at him about how much you hate him and how you wish he would've left you with Heidi and how you wish he would've left you back in Santa Fe and how you wish he would've just  _ let you die_ _._

He turns to face you with a darkness clouding his eyes, stalks over to you. You think he might hit you so you cringe in readiness and turn your head away from him.

It all happens so fast: he squeezes your face in his hand and leans down toward your lips, stopping to look at you. The serious look on his face makes you shudder. Your heart starts racing when you feel his breath warm on your skin, watch as he quickly ducks his head and ghosts chapped lips over yours then pulls away as if he had been burnt just as you lean in for more, always want more more more of him.

He steps back, runs a hand over his face. Either doesn't or can't look at you.

"I'm sorry—"

"Why did you stop?" He begins to speak and you know exactly what he's gonna say. "And don't tell me it's because we're crossing a major line because, I don't know if you've noticed, but we crossed it a little while ago."

He looks at you with a clenched-shut jaw and beautiful eyes and you really want him to kiss you again.

"I can't lose anybody else."

"So," you walk over until you can reach out and touch his chest, but you don't, "you're gonna let that hold you back from being happy again? 'Cause the people you've lost would want nothing more than for you to find your way."

Hazel eyes search your face, the slope of your brow and the curve of your cheek and they land on your lips in contemplation.

_ Kiss me. Please_ _._ You silently plead with him, as if the color of your eyes or the lick of your lips will entice him enough to cross over the threshold from reluctant companion to reluctant lover. But he never does, instead forces himself to run a hand through his slowly greying hair and close exhausted eyes.

"I need to take a breather," he says, wasting no time in throwing his bag over his shoulder and fleeing from the safety of concrete walls to get away from  you.

* * *

By the time he gets back, you already have his rations set out for him and are reading by the light of the moon shining through your 'bedroom' window, in a chair you normally use to keep watch.

You hear him come in, no matter how quiet he's trying to be. He asks you what you're reading, lays both hands on your shoulders and begins tracing your spine at the back of your neck with calloused thumbs.

"Um," you can't think with his fingers on you, always wonder what his fingers would feel like inside you, always think about how professionally he eats peaches and, " _ Alice's Adventures in Wonderland _ ."

"A classic," he replies, and for a moment you wonder if you're dreaming because there's no way he's willingly being this intimate and talkative with you. He never is, says very few nice words to you before he shuts himself down and turns back into the scrooge you've known and loved.

_This_ makes you uncomfortable because it isn't like him. You tilt your head back and break eye contact with your book to look up at him, at the turmoil raging in his eyes. He looks down at you, looks as if he's contemplating something before he tells you he's gonna eat and walks away.

* * *

That night you dream of calloused hands exploring the slopes of your body and the softness of your skin, and they stretch you in a way that make you whine. When you wake you find yourself grinding your ass against Joel's groin, to your horror. The labored breaths against your ear makes gooseflesh raise on your skin and you gasp when his arm wraps around your waist and pull you closer against his chest.

"Joel," you attempt to say, yet it comes out as a whimper. "Joel, wake up!"

Everything falls silent as he starts to rouse from sleep, a muted horror radiating from behind you.

"(Name), I—"

"We can't keep going like this." You sigh, sit up when he moves back onto his mattress. "It's gonna make us act stupid."

"We already are, (Name)," he grumbles with a sigh.

You pull your knees to your chest and rest your cheek atop them, watch the silhouette of your companion move.

It's quiet for a few minutes as both of you try to organize your thoughts and think of how to approach this.

"I like you more than I should," you whisper, hear the sigh he emits.

"Yeah, I was afraid of that." Joel trails off with a yawn, sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed. "I'm afraid we're in the same boat."

To hear him say it surprises you. He's not one for feelings, or emotion in general.  He just admitted he has feelings for you, that he cares about you.

"Yeah, we are."

* * *

The two of you get ambushed on your way to the city to look for supplies. A woman comes to your aid, stationed on a roof with her rifle that she uses to shoot down the attacking gang members.

Her name is Marni, thirty-two, with a husband and a five-year-old son. She greets you with a hospitable countenance, and you and Joel share a look of wariness. The nice ones are always trouble.

When Joel leaves with her husband to go supply hunting (but you secretly know he'sscoping them out to plan how to steal from them or something), she questions you about your relationship.

"We're just friends."

She gives you an unamused look. "Sweetheart, I have a husband. And I've been around a lot longer than you. I know love when I see it."

You sigh. "He won't admit it 'cause he's stubborn as hell, though."

"All guys are," she states, resting a hand on your shoulder. "He's obviously been through a lot. Cut him some slack."

* * *

You feel guilty about Joel killing them. He comes back alone, Marni's husband nowhere to be found, before he takes her somewhere under the guise of explaining what happened and slaughters her.

You help him take their supplies and coats for the upcoming winter. You take the boy with you ("Joel, we ain't fuckin' leaving him.") in hopes of dropping him off at the small town you pass on your way back to the jail.

You figure out that his name is Toby. His favorite color is red and he really likes rice. He doesn't know who Johnny Cash is, and you're quick to solve that problem with the cassette tape you carry around everywhere.  _Ring of Fire is my new favorite song_, he says.

You don't wanna leave him alone in this world, because he symbolizes everything that you've been fighting for: life and survival and innocence. You don't want any of that ruined for him, but Joel doesn't care.

"It's us against the world," your companion tells you once Toby has fallen asleep on your shoulder. "And that's how it's gonna stay."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK SO I MOVE INTO MY DORM IN A LITTLE OVER A WEEK AND IM SO EXCITED/SCARED 
> 
> so updates might be a little slow for the next few weeks until I get settled with college life and everything. I gotta say though, this story is pretty close to being done. I'm planning a sequel though so don't worry too much
> 
> As always, leave me thoughts, criticisms, suggestions, and just general support. If you'd like you can follow me on my instagram (which is the only social media I use) so we can chat about the story and feels or you can just admire my aesthetic: @flowerpowder


	9. Affections

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By this point, you've learned to never say anything when he gives you affection. You've learned to simply welcome it and store it inside your dearest memories.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SEXUAL CONTENT WARNING YES I SAID IT FOLKS

Love makes you weak. You realize that now. That's what Joel has been so afraid of this whole time, what's he's been trying to tell you. Don't get attached.

You wake up in a cold sweat, gooseflesh prickling your skin at the feeling of something warm pressing against your back, at the breath softly tickling the nape of your neck.

Panic sets in, and you slowly unwrap the hand from around your waist, mattress creaking as you raise up to sit back on the chair at the window where you're supposed to be keeping watch.

He'd warned about this—getting too close, separating duty and survival from pleasure and  _ humanity_. Now you can see why. You're starting to make mistakes, let your feelings cloud your judgement—your eyes had once lingered too long on him and a runner had almost bitten you; the sight of him trapped under a hunter with a blade inches from his eye made you waste half of your sacred ammunition; you were starting to slack on watch, instead radiating toward the warmth of his body and the way he clutched onto you as if you were his lifeline while he slept, because it was only when he slept that you could steal kisses and touches of his arm, his back, run a hand through his dark hair - all things you wish you could do while he's awake and hovering above you and laying claim to you with his body, his tongue, his cock, all while calling you  _ his_ girl.

And although he increasingly reprimands you for your lapses in judgement, he always has a way of giving you false hope—stealing touches that would mean nothing to anyone else, but for you they're the only thing that keeps you going. There are moments—split seconds that you would miss if you blink—where his eyes glint with affection or guilt or sadness, and you want to take him into your arms and let him douse you with his burdens and regrets so you can carry them, too.

You realize that you're in far too deep at this point. The one thing you had sworn yourself you wouldn't do, and with a glance in your direction the first time you met, everything got screwed up. Your whole life now revolves around him—he's your shelter, your support, the only one you can trust with everything but the weight of your affections. He's hardened, knows where these things lead.  _ Don't get attached to anybody_, he always says, unbeknownst that the number one breaker of that rule is his companion in all this.

* * *

It's odd that the only CD inside the truck you've been using is nothing but love songs. And they're all too fitting, about reluctant love and mutual pining and trying to admit feelings for the other person.

After the fifth song in a row comes on, talking about mutually broken people and kisses and loneliness, Joel shuts the music off completely.

You look over at him with a frown. "You could've just skipped it."

"I needed quiet anyways," he grumbles, taps his fingers nervously against the wheel.

There's obviously something off with him today. The kicker is getting what's bothering him out in the open.

"You wanna tell me what's bothering you?"

"Not really," he says with a tired sigh.

"Want me to drive?"

"Not really."

"Want me to shut up?"

"Not—okay,  _ yes _ for that one."

You share a chuckle and then there's silence.

It was a mutual agreement to drop the boy off and immediately leave the jail to travel to someplace safe after the ambush.

Neither of you know where you're going, and it's nice. It feels like before, when the two of you had no set goal, no fixed compass pointing you toward Boston. You were in no hurry, just drifting with the wind and allowing a feeling of freedom to bathe the trip.

"This is nice," you say, interrupting the comfortable silence.

"What's nice?" he asks, glancing over at you from the corner of his eye.

" _This_ ." You wave a hand toward the stretch of land in front of you, at the wide open space that seemingly went on for miles. "Freedom, I guess."

"Well, don't get used to it, Hillbilly, 'cause we won't be having none of that once we get to Boston."

That's exactly what you're afraid of.

* * *

You love him you love him you love him. You have to tell him, have to kiss him, have to  _protect_ _him._

The hand fisted in your hair yanks your head back and you cry out, freeze at the cold metal of the blade against your neck. Joel yells, lets out a grunt of pain and you hear him collapse to the pavement of the street below.

The woman holding you nicks your skin with the stiletto knife, and when she pulls away you're able to maneuver out of her arms, wedge the blade into  _her _ neck this time. Blood splatters over your face when you yank the knife from the soft flesh, and you turn to find Joel interrogating the man, crisp white bone jutting from the gang member's forearm.

Sometimes you forget how unforgiving Joel can be.

You've gotten this down to a science and quickly start stripping the woman of her shirt and jacket, taking weapons and her heavy pack.

A calloused hand suddenly rests against the back of your neck and you shiver, stand up and turn around to face a bloody Joel.

"You alright, kiddo?" He presses his thumb against the small cut on your neck.

You gulp, and you can feel the pressure of his skin against yours as you swallow, know that he can feel it, too. "I'm fine."

He presses a kiss to the top of your head, says, "Don't you ever scare me like that again," against your hair.

You wrap your arms around him, clutch onto him so he won't slip from your grasp, so you know that both he and this moment are real.

It happens. You don't know how or why or when things changed for him but he's aggressive and desperate and everything you knew he would be the first time he kissed you.

His beard leaves you with red, raw cheeks and his mouth leave you with swollen lips and the whole experience leaves you with embarrassment and a face that feels as if it's on fire.

"Finally," you whisper when he finally pulls away, raking fingers through his dark hair.

"Yeah," he says, tugs your hand away and slips his hardened mask back on and looks at you with darkened eyes. "We'd better get going."

* * *

It sticks with you. God, does it stick with you. He's experienced, knows how to work you like a perfectly-tuned guitar.

He feels more like himself, yet a more carefree version, as if a massive chip has been lifted off his shoulders. He's still as serious and cynical as before, but he does little things for you, says little things to let you know that he cares.

The one thing that both scares you and causes butterflies to churn your stomach is that his protectiveness has caused him to become absolutely ruthless. A killing machine, a one man army... a man who's found his purpose again.

He doesn't kiss you as often as you'd like or expect, only when an immediate threat has been extinguished, crushed underneath your heel.

You notice a change in yourself, as well. The Darkness starts to take over. The sickness you once felt when taking someone's life has started to slowly wane. You don't flinch when Joel pops someone's knee off or shatters bones.

It scares you. The fact that you're losing your humanity, losing the significance of life.

* * *

_ "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me—" _

Joel yanks you back to his chest, cupping a hand over your mouth to stifle your cry of surprise.

" _Don't _ let 'em see you," he whispers into your ear before letting you go.

You peek around the corner of the building, not expecting the kneeling cult before you to be standing, making direct eye contact.

"Uhhhh, Joel? I think we have trouble."

Then they start sprinting straight for you and you grab Joel's hand and dart into an alleyway. You lock the gate, recoil back when they attempt to grab you through the chain-links, shouting, "Sinner!" all the while.

Joel yanks you back by the hood of your jacket, orders you to find a way out while he secures the alley.

He lifts you onto a fire escape after you had spotted it and the ladder had broken off from your weight when you attempted to ascend.

The third story window leads you to a room, then down a flight of stairs and another and another and another until you hit the basement. The ceilings are low, causing Joel to hit his head when he first walks in. You can't help but chuckle at the large thud and a following string of creative expletives.

The room at the end of the basement emits the most foul smelling odor you've ever encountered. Even more than the ditch full of dead bodies. When you open the door the sight that greets you is one that causes even Joel to double over and dry heave.

An altar sits along the back wall, various crosses and paintings of Jesus hanging above it. The juxtaposition of the religious symbolism and the naked bodies slung atop one another make you want to laugh at the grotesque irony.

"Now we see why they wanted you so bad."

The dead were sliced open from neck to groin, all women under the age of twenty-five by the looks of it—there are little girls,  _ babies _ in the mix. Organs are separated into neat stacks and a freshly killed little girl lay upon the altar, a set of cutting tools next to her and candles placed in intricate patterns around a design on the ground.

You've never seen Joel look so upset. He walks up to the girl, closes her eyes and crosses dainty, bloodied hands across her stomach.

He turns away, runs a hand over his face.

"You okay?"

He pushes past you and nods his head.

"Let's just go."

* * *

You don't remember how you got here, and you don't know where Joel is. Your arm is handcuffed to an old pipe running up from the basement to the first floor. A little girl lay next to you, barely conscious from the blow to the side of her head, mirroring your own. 

Two women walk in, dressed in long flowey dresses that are too long for their legs, too modest for the stifling heat of the basement that's caused sweat to burn your eyes and pool into every crevice of your body.

They walk over to you, strip you of your clothes, and drag you into the room with the dead bodies. You're too weak and confused to protest.

"Your sacrifice will bring this world the salvation it needs, my child," the older woman tells you. "Repent for your wicked ways, for the soul must be cleansed in order to see the gates of Heaven."

From the corner of your eye, you see it.

The younger woman walks up to the dead girl at the altar and begins slicing her from breastbone to groin. You start panicking, a renewed vigor of survival lit aflame by the barbarity of the woman's actions.

The older woman is surprisingly strong for her age, pinning you down and pressing a fresh blade to your neck.

"Repent while there is still time!"

"Get the fuck off me, you crazy—"

She pierces your skin, sinks the knife into your shoulder, and you cry out, thrashing wildly against her and trying to push her away.

"Let her go!" the little girl calls, jumps onto the older woman's back and begins striking the nape of her neck with a small switchblade.

Blood runs down her front and drips onto your face before she eventually collapses on top of you.

"Sister Emmaline!"

You had forgotten about the other one.

You tell the girl to run and hide while the woman advances toward you, brandishing a blood-stained knife from beneath her dress. She attempts a swipe at you and you manage to dodge her attacks until you find the opening you need to end this.

You allow her to tackle you and wrestle you to the ground, but she isn't able to will the energy to hold you down after her struggle to strike you.

You drive the blade that had been in your shoulder into the front of the woman's neck, saw it back and forth until she's almost decapitated and the blood coats you like a second skin and your hair is completely wet and sticky.

You kick her off, roll over onto your knees and clutch at your aching shoulder.

The girl returns a minute later and tell you she knows where Joel is.

"Third floor, room next to the window. I can hear screaming."

You throw on clothes and leave the girl with a _thanks_.

Joel meets you at the top of the steps, fresh gash along his forearm.

You don't even think about it, just immediately fall into him and now you know you're safe and with him you can do anything and _you love him_.

"Thank God you're okay. I thought I lost you," he whispers, envelops wiry arms around your shoulders and you're home.

"Can't get rid of me that easily, Cowboy."

* * *

You make it back to your truck after slaughtering the whole cult—or the members that are in the town.

You never see the girl again.

The two of you head toward Des Moines—167 miles isn't so bad—and you decide to quiz him on what happened in that basement.

"Hey, Joel?"

He straightens up and shakes his head in an attempt to keep himself awake. "Yeah, kid."

"Who did you see in that little girl?"

He sighs and tells you she's a child, that's he's supposed to be upset. But you know better.

"Joel, you've killed children in front of their parents before. You don't feel bad when a kid dies, so why her?"

"She looked like—" his voice breaks and he clears his throat to keep his composure, "—like Sarah." His daughter. "I felt like that was my only chance to tell her goodbye."

"You never got to?"

"Everything happened too fast. We had to get outta town as soon as possible." He runs a hand down his face and sighs again. "Let's just... talk about something else."

You can't help but apologize and lower your head.

The rest of the ride to the city is conducted in silence, and you eventually fall asleep amidst Joel's humming and the sound of the car.

Joel shakes you awake and tells you that you're in Des Moines, that your best bet would be to make it to the capital building before sundown, as it's the most fortified building in the area. Getting there, however, is a different story.

You're stopped by a group of five—a man, two women, and two children—and the leader asks you where you're headed.

"The capital building," Joel says.

Your companion turns to you and both of you have the same exact look on your face:  _ please don't be going there please don't be going there...! _

"Oh, really? That's where we're headed!"

....

_ MOTHER. FUCKER. _

"Well then you guys can go on ahead, with the kids and all."  _ Bless you, Joel. _

"Let's just all go together. More firepower, right?"

Joel holds out a hand to silence the man. "Listen, we're more of a two-wolf pack, buddy."

The red-headed woman turns to the man and puts a hand on his shoulder. "Peter, they don't want to travel with us. For good reason, though." Without moving her head, she looks you up and down and rolls her eyes. "I'm sure they like their alone time."

Joel quickly steps in front of you, and you know he can obviously see the look of disgust on your face, knows that you aren't above climbing someone like a tree for pissing you off.

"Don't you fucking—"

"Stop." The finality in Joel's voice makes you look up at him, grab at the arm at your middle holding you back. "Not now."

"Amanda didn't mean any harm," Peter says to diffuse the situation, but the shit-eating grin on her face is just begging to be curb-stomped off.

Joel grabs your bicep and drags you off, hissing to them, "We're leaving," as you pass.

* * *

You find a relatively untouched office on the upper floor to stay in, moving furniture against the doors and situating couches to make a bed.

The first thing you do is sit down and start applying first aid to your wounds. Joel helps you begin to clean your wound and wrap your shoulder, circles a strong hand around your bicep to keep you from moving away. You tilt your head to the side, grit your teeth when the burn from the alcohol digs into your skin.

You glance over at him, and the look he's giving you stops you in your tracks. It's... relief and frenzy and he mutters something before pressing heated lips to the pulse of your neck. The burn in your shoulder is long-forgotten, even as he continues to disinfect it, yet he runs lips and teeth along your skin to distract you and you moan and whine and clutch at the back of his shirt with your free hand.

He breaks away with one last nip and finishes wrapping it up, says nothing as you help him clean the dried blood and grime from his arm.

By this point, you've learned to never say anything when he gives you affection. You've learned to simply welcome it and store it inside your dearest memories.

You've realized that it's because he thinks there's something wrong with showing affection. As if he deserves to neither give or receive it. If you point it out, it makes the act real, tangible, as if it isn't just a fantasy or a dream Joel's concocted within the confines of his mind, and that makes him uncomfortable. 

"What happened back there?" 

Both of you ask the question at the same time, and you can't help but chuckle at each other's timing.

"You first."

Your speech is synchronized again, and you cover Joel's mouth with your hand.

"You first," you're finally able to say, allowing him to speak and explain what he went through back at the town.

He sighs, starts gathering up the supplies and slipping them back into your designated bags. "After they surrounded us and knocked us out, I woke up in that room upstairs. It's where they take the men, I guess..."

You listen as he tells you about his experience, about the attempted removal of his genitals and how he managed to break free and smash some guy's head in.

He finishes and asks you to tell your story, about the little girl that saved your life and the nuns that attacked you and how they called you the  _ savior of this world  _ and by the end of your story you're yawning from exhaustion and resting against Joel's side.

"Let's hope we never meet them freaks again," you say in finality, curling up under the tattered blanket you're sharing—the same one you've had since Santa Fe.

* * *

You wake up the next morning to hear Joel rummaging through drawers and slamming cabinets and you ask him what the fuck he's doing, that it's barely dawn.

"This fucker saved up a lotta toiletries in the bathroom over there."

Something lands on your stomach over the blanket, and you look down to see men's deodorant, virtually untouched.

"Holy fuckballs."

He tosses some other things onto your lap—toothpaste and a toothbrush, and you're quick to brush your teeth for the first time in forever.

"Would he happen to have a bath?"

"Yup."

* * *

After driving to the nearest lake and collecting buckets of water, you come back to the office and start filling the massive tub.

The fucking jets work.

"Must be a generator or somethin'g" Joel says as you begin to strip.

"Wanna join?" you ask teasingly, throw a sultry grin over your shoulder, and you almost croak when he tugs off his shirt.

At the look of surprise on your face he starts to laugh, says, "You shouldn't have tested me."

It's fairly easy to ignore each other's nakedness inside the large bath. The water is lukewarm, causing chills to spring up across your skin, yet you're forgiving because it makes you feel clean again.

You let Joel make the first touch—a simple brush of fingertips against your shin that makes you look over at him, his brow furrowed despite the relaxed posture.

"You cold?"

You nod your head. "A little."

He beckons you over with a swing of his arm and you crawl to him, rest on your haunches to wait for his next command.

He sits forward and touches you first, always first, brushing calloused fingertips against your ribs and tracing the curve of your breast. You take a deep breath before closing your eyes and leaning into his touch.

You hear the water stir as he moves, and you open your eyes to find his face a breath away from yours.

"Are we doing the right thing here?" he whispers, and you can hardly say a  _yes_ with the lump stuck in your throat.

When he dips his head down and arches your back with his hand, you gasp, immediately digging blunt nails into his freckled shoulders, and his warm breath ghosting over your nipple makes you shiver.

"Jesus, Joel, just—"

Banging on the office door makes the two of you immediately part and grab for your clothes.

"If it isn't one goddamn, motherfucking thing, it's another," Joel hisses, tells you to stay here while he checks out who it is.

The door opens, and the voices of your visitors sound all-too familiar.

"Hey, (Name). Get out here!"

You open the bathroom door and are immediately pounced upon by a squealing Maya.

"Maya, let the poor woman open the door all the way before you jump her," Heidi says with a laugh.

You're speechless, flabbergasted at the sudden visit from your friends. Heidi pulls you to her when Maya finally lets go, holds you at arms' length to inspect you.

"So," she grins, "how's that leg?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello hello i hope you enjoyed, stuff is finally happening
> 
> so exCITED FOR COLLEGE I MOVE INTO MY DORM ON THURSDAY
> 
> that's about it other than i'm rlly sick right now and idk if i'll be able to squeeze another chapter out before the end of the week
> 
> LEAVE ME COMMENTS AND SUPPORT AND SUGGESTIONS AND ALL THAT STUFF <3


	10. Firsts—Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "We all miss people," he says reassuringly, allows you to rest your head on his chest so he can wrap a soothing arm around you. "But we gotta keep going and surviving so they can live on through us." 
> 
> "It's hard, Joel," you mutter, finally feeling as if you can breathe now that the weight of your morbid thoughts are off your chest. "... Living, I mean. A lotta times I don't wanna do it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this might be my favorite chapter I've ever written but also it feels awkward to me but idk
> 
> ALSO me and my friends watched a TLOU playthrough and I was high and I noticed so many things that i didn't notice while sober. Like I was literally analyzing everything and I cried
> 
> also i got a tattoo that says "endure/survive" with ellie's knife in the middle and i love it
> 
> also college is awesome so

"Still wearing that crusty plaid shirt?" Heidi asks Joel, tugging at the arm of it.

"It's been a trustworthy companion," he says, and the offended look on his face makes you laugh.

The woman looks over at you and smiles. "Nice to see the two of you still together and in one piece."

"Agreed," you say, looping your arm around Joel's.

You can tell he's still annoyed at the interruption, no matter how happy he is that Heidi and Maya are here, because he shakes you off with a huff and walks over to the couch where your supplies are.

Heidi hits your arm to attract your attention, and without saying anything she asks what's up with him.

"Guy stuff, I guess." You shrug, join Joel on the couch with Heidi and Maya trailing behind.

* * *

They go back to their room later that night, leaving the two of you alone once more.

The tension is awkward and sexual and if he doesn't hurry and make a move you think you're gonna implode.

Both of you brush your teeth—you forgot how nice a clean mouth felt—and collapse onto your bed, you making the decision to shed your uncomfortable pants to make for a more satisfying rest.

"It's like you're  trying to kill me over here," Joel grumbles, kicks off his boots and spreads out on his stomach anyway.

You haven't felt this well in a long-ass time. Despite the pain in your shoulder, you're more clean than you've been in years, you have Joel next to you, and you aren't in any immediate danger. There's no way for it to get better.

You curl up against his side and throw a leg over his own and an arm over his back, resting your head on one of his shoulders.

"What're you doing?" he mutters into his pillow, moves his arm to reach your head and scratch your scalp.

"Getting comfy," you reply, moan under his touch and he freezes for a moment or two before eventually resuming his actions.

It isn't long until you fall asleep, and when you wake up you're on your side facing away from him, and his fingers are tracing patterns into your shoulder blades and the dip of your lower back and over your spine, and you let out a contented sigh to let him know you're awake.

"What're you doing up?" you mutter, "And why are you still laying in bed? That's not like you."

"It's not the asscrack of dawn yet, so I got a few more minutes."

You chuckle, think about how nice this is and how much it feels like Before, when you could just lay in bed with your companion and not have to worry about infected and people trying to kill you and you roll over, reach out and scratch at his beard.

"Do you think... things would be different if the outbreak wouldn't have happened?"

He sighs, pulls your hand away and rolls onto his back. "Well... Sarah would be alive. And I would probably still be at the same nine-to-five job."

"It's weird to think that in some alternate universe, we've never even met."

He looks over at you, pats your hip. "Well, let's just be glad we're in this one, huh?"

A smile stretches your face so wide that it hurts. "I'm really glad I met you, old man."

He chuckles. "Same here, kid."

Despite the euphoria, a sadness seeps into the cracks where happiness can never fully reach. There are people that should be here, people that the both of you miss more every day.

"I miss my brother," you whisper, curl up against your companion's side in hopes that his presence can shield you from the bad thoughts.

"We all miss people," he says reassuringly, allows you to rest your head on his chest so he can wrap a soothing arm around you. "But we gotta keep going and surviving so they can live on through  _us_."

"It's hard, Joel," you mutter, finally feeling as if you can breathe now that the weight of your morbid thoughts are off your chest. "... Living, I mean. A lotta times I don't wanna do it."

He's silent for a moment, doesn't even breathe as he sorts through cluttered thoughts.

"Life wouldn't be too good if I were by myself, ya know."

"You'll be fine."

"Don't even think about going and doing anything crazy."

You scoff, roll over and scoot to the other side of the bed just for spite. "Why?"

"'Cause it'd kill me, dumbass."

The rest of the night is spent in an awkward silence from both confessions, and you don't stir until Joel starts to finally snore.

A nice walk would do you some good at this point. To get away and just be by yourself.

Heidi is sitting on the front steps of the building, watching Maya as she plays hopscotch on the sidewalk... in the middle of the night. She turns around once she hears the door creak open and gives you a small, melancholic smile.

"Hey, kiddo," she says, patting the concrete next to her to prompt you to sit.

You plop down and curl into yourself against the chill of the wind.

"Hey, Heidi."

"How are things?"

"Same as they've always been."

"You and Joel?"

You pause, look over at her with a reddened face and wide eyes.

"We're okay."

She gives you an  _are you serious_ look, and you shrink under her gaze.

"I've been around the block a few times, (Name). Something's changed between you two."

You can't hide the smile on your face at the thought of him during these last few months. He confessed, kissed you, told you he's better with you here.

"We finally told each other our feelings, and to be honest, it's the best thing I've ever done."

She gives you a knowing smile. "What did I tell you?"

You roll your eyes and smile. "Yeah, yeah. I know."

Heidi raises her hands at the elbow and says, "Hey, I was just saying."

"What were you just saying?"

Both of you turn around at the Texan drawl in the person's words to find Joel leaning against the closed door, arms folded across his chest.

"How lucky you are to have a woman like (Name)," Heidi says, patting your knee.

"You ain't wrong," he sighs, moving to open the door. "Hillbilly, can I talk to you a sec?"

You gulp and follow after him.

As soon as the door closes, he explodes on you.

"What the hell are you thinking, goin' out alone?" he hisses as he points a finger toward the door.

"I—"

"I woke up and you were gone and I was  _terrified_." The worried, panicked look in his eyes makes you fist the front of his button-up in hand. "You should've told me." He clenches your fist in his and rests your forehead against his own.

"Joel, I..." You pull away from him, fold your arms across your chest. "Tell me what  _this_ ,"  you motion between the two of you, "is."

He gives you a pointed look before attempting to pass you. "We ain't doing this."

You get so mad at that simple sentence that you want to punch him. But you settle on pushing him instead. His elbow props him against the wall after you throw him off-balance.

"Don't you start that shit! After everything the two of us have been through, after everything that's happened between us, and you still wanna do this?"

"I told you before: if you die, it'll crush me! I can't handle losing someone so important to me again."

In an act of sheer need and courage, you reach forward and pull him to you, press experienced lips against yours. He immediately fists a hand in your hair and wraps an arm around your back, tilts your head so your mouths are perfectly aligned.

You pull away gasping, then gasp again when he takes you by the arm and drags you to your room.

"What're you—"

"Shut it!" The desperation in his voice makes a shiver run down your spine. And not a good one.

_ The boy with the angry hands and the Darkness in his heart. _

He slams the door and turns to look at you, and once he notices the look on your face his eyes turn soft.

"I ain't him," he whispers, holding your face between the palms of his hands. "We don't gotta rush into it, (Name)."

You can't believe this is happening is he really doing this right now—

"What about not wanting to get close to someone?" you whisper, cringing when he lowers his hands to his sides because he gets a steely look in his eyes and you really really really don't want him to hurt you like he has so many others.

"You're right," he mumbles, tossing his backpack onto the coffee table then getting back into bed.

Within a few minutes he starts snoring, his time asleep the only time he doesn't scowl, looks as if the demons of his past are sleeping, too.

* * *

The first time you have sex, he allows you full control, an act that surprises you. He trusts you, has always trusted you with the supplies, the food, his  _ life_.

It doesn't hurt, feels like pressure, and you can't help but smile and laugh when he starts making dad jokes. He tries to make you comfortable in every way possible: _just tell me where to touch, are you alright, does_ that _feel good?_

You sigh once you're fully seated on him, allow him to touch you once the initial nerves have settled and you're able to watch him.

He's cautious, as if you're a fragile vase that might tip over at the slightest movement. But you're fine with being a fragile vase, because that means that he cares. He sees you as something worth keeping and cherishing for a long time.

Joel runs rough fingertips over the skin of your belly, stopping to cup the underside of your breast. You sigh and let out a low moan when he brushes a thumb across your nipple, keep focusing on the fact that it's _his_ hand and nobody else's.

"This alright?" He asks, keeps asking to make sure you're comfortable and in control of the situation and you smile through tears because  _ you love him_.

"I care too much about you," you choke out, eventually finding a balance and rhythm with his help that makes him grit his teeth and groan deep within his chest. "Is  _ this _ okay?"

"Jesus, yes."

He helps you find new angles and techniques that feel even better, and by the end a coil has started in your belly and is tightening faster than ever before. It's so much better than touching yourself, so special and emotional because it's him and he'll be the one you think about tomorrow and the next day and a month from now and years down the road after you both have moved on and... that thought makes you sad. Then he angles your hips just right and it snaps you back to the present, back to the sweat beading on your forehead and trailing from the underside of your breasts, to the intermingling scent of sex and adoration and the woodsy smell that is him, to the way the pit of your belly grows hotter and hotter and you think you might die if you don't keep going.

"Joel, I—"

"I know, baby girl. Just take it slow. I'm still here, ain't I?"

You can't hold back tears at his comment, lean down to press your forehead against his. "We both are. God, we're still alive, Joel."

You allow him to touch you, and he circles his thumb over the place that makes you gasp, makes you dig blunt nails into his shoulders.

Surprisingly, you finish before he does, him having petted and worked you like a professional would. It feels odd, nice, a little gross when he spends himself inside you, but when he lets out a relieved laugh and grins at you and tells you how he couldn't have made it by himself, it makes the whole experience the best in your entire life.

The rest of the night, the two of you lounge around, making jokes and talking about the Before and he tells you how much he misses Sarah, how badly it's affected him. He lets you embrace him, lets you throw a leg over his hip and wrap comforting arms around him, gives you more control and finally grants you access into the dark recesses of his mind.

* * *

When morning comes, you wake actually feeling rested. He wakes in a better mood than usual—still his grumpy self, just not as noticeable.

Neither of you bring it up, just continue on with your daily ritual until night comes...

... and you ask him to do it again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. Gimme comments and feedback and stuff. Chapters are gonna be slower now that I'm in college, but I'm TRYING I PROMISE.


	11. Inevitibility

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything always comes to an end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen to "All I Want" by Kodaline to maximize the feels (that totally isn't what I listened to when I made this chapter nope).
> 
> Also this is the last chapter of Curiosity, but I'm already working on the sequel. More details will be released ASAP.

Surprisingly, not much changes between you two. However, you both grow more protective of each other, stay intimate behind closed doors.

It doesn't bother you that he wants to keep you two relatively secret. You understand. People will use you against him, him against you, so you have to seem professional and distant when around others.

Heidi, however, doesn't buy it. Like always, she knows, always fucking knows, and it's really exhausting when you're trying to keep a secret. One day, you hear her lecturing Joel about taking care of you and not overstepping boundaries and you laugh, think to yourself that  _you crossed them a long time ago_.

* * *

Being in love should be fun, a one-of-a-kind experience that leaves you breathless and tripping over clumsy feet. But in an apocalypse, none of that happens. You worry and worry and worry about him, always on guard for his safety, make mistakes you shouldn't make and he yells at you and always lets you make the first intimate move and you oblige him. The fights end in angry sex that leaves you limping and sore and bruised and satisfied, leaves him with scratches and hickeys and a smugness that only you can give.

He can be gentle, too, likes to cuddle and give you quick kisses and words of endearment when nobody is watching; calls you sweetheart, babygirl, other Texan pet names that only he understands.

You've found out, though, that Joel alone and Joel around other people are two completely different personalities. Gentle, docile when you're alone, and intense and protective when you do something stupid. Unrelenting, cynical, a force to be reckoned with when facing others. 

It takes you over a year to complete your beginning task of finding Tommy. When they finally meet, he and Joel hug and make jokes and give each other noogies and it makes you happy... But it makes you sad because you wish you could have that with your brother, wish you could argue and laugh and hear his voice tell you how much of a dumbass you are.

"Hey, kiddo," Tommy says, smiling and clapping a hand on your shoulder. "Long time, no see."

* * *

Joel eventually gets caught up in a gang, to Tommy's dismay. But you don't expect the brothers to almost physically fight each other in an argument and result in Tommy leaving to join the Fireflies. 

"Joel's outta control. You gotta reign him in, (Name)," Tommy tells you before he leaves.

You don't know what the gang life explicitly entails since you've never had to be part of one, but it has to be so bad that Tommy ups and leaves, giving you a warning on the way out.

It takes over two years after staying in Boston for Joel to finally abandon you.

You see it coming: he slowly stops paying you attention, spends more time with a woman named Tess, keeps telling you that you need to start learning to do things independently instead of relying on him.

He bursts through the door one day, immediately starts shoving collected clothes and supplies and weapons into a few bags.

You shoot up from the couch, the book you had been reading tossed onto the coffee table. "Joel, what—"

"Nothing to concern yourself with," he grumbles, throws bags to Tess as she walks in.

She doesn't even acknowledge your existence.

"Are you leaving?" you ask, a sudden chill blanketing your body.

You're scared. You don't want him to leave you. He's been the only thing keeping you alive. He lied to you.  _Life wouldn't be too good if I were by myself, ya know_.  But he isn't by himself anymore. He has  _her,_ so he doesn't need you.

"I gotta go somewhere for a few days, and—"

You're angry. Want to throw everything in sight because how could he do this to you after everything you've given up for him? You know it isn't just a little trip. He's packing too much.

You think about the Quarantine Zone, how you allowed him to drag you here and now he's leaving you behind to fend for yourself, willingly allowed you to trap yourself inside a prison because he knew that you would do anything for him.

"I came to Boston, lost my  _freedom _ for you!" You circle around the coffee table and approach him, suddenly stopped by Tess. You shake her off. "Just like that. After everything."

He can't look at you and it makes you even angrier because he knows how much your fucking heart is breaking.

"We ain't talking about this." He finalizes the conversation, collects the last of his things, and takes one last glance at you as he passes Tess on his way out.

"Sorry kid," she says, trailing behind him.

* * *

Like you expected, he never returned. You hear mentions of his name from the underground criminals in Boston, talks of how ruthless and cold he is.

Not your Joel.

Tommy comes to visit you every once in a while, each time offering you to join the Fireflies ( _ I ain't pushing. I just know that you're having a rough time and I think you would do a good job with us _ ). He's trying to give you a purpose again, to get you out of this city and away from your memory of Joel.

You eventually oblige him, allow yourself to be smuggled out of the city and into Joel and Tess's path.

The look on Joel's face when he sees the two of you approaching is seventeen shades of confusion and anger, expressions you've never really seen before.

"Tommy, what the hell do you think you're doing?" Joel attempts to grab your arm when you pass, but you cower into his brother's side. Under the coldness of his gaze, you see hurt, as if  _you're _ the one who betrayed  _him_.

"Cleaning up the mess you made," he says, drags you past Joel, and you can finally breathe again when the weight of imprisonment lifts from your shoulders as you exit the city.

* * *

Over the next year, you learn to adjust to life without the man that had been your sole purpose in the world. Tommy teaches you to open up to others, to fill your heart with kindness and hospitality and all things that aren't the Darkness. He helps you scrape the sticky tar out and you swear you can hear your lost companion protest in earnest when you fill the space with friendship and light—things that Joel wouldn't approve of.

When Tommy mentors you on the ways of trust, you think you can hear Joel cry about peaches and the Darkness and how you only felt safe with the touches _his_ hands dealt.

It's a process, living. Surviving. Enduring when you feel as if you're on your last leg and the only way out is death. But you learn.

Your curiosity grows stronger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's actually pretty sad that the first part has already ended, but now Reader has closure and is starting a new life with the Fireflies. 
> 
> Will her and Joel get reunited? Will she find some other dude? Is she going to be turned into a badass killing machine? I have no idea. B)
> 
> ALSO IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE MORE OF ME OR TALK ABOUT CURIOSITY WHILE I WRITE THE SEQUEL, FOLLOW MY INSTA: @flowerpowder
> 
> Love you guys! It's been an amazing journey, so thank you for all the support. It means the world to me.


	12. SEQUEL

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> THE SEQUEL HAS BEEN ADDED

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. THE SEQUEL HAS BEEN ADDED

  * **THE SEQUEL HAS BEEN ADDED**



 

**http://archiveofourown.org/works/8138288/chapters/18653975**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2\. THE SEQUEL HAS BEEN ADDED


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